Oceania HIV News

HIV-negative gay men in Sydney, Australia perceive the risk of HIV transmission to be different in different sexual contexts, according to a study by Dr Limin Mao and colleagues, reported in the May issue of AIDS & Behavior. But men pay considerably more attention to condom use, withdrawal and sexual role than they do to their partner’s reported HIV status or viral load in assessing the risk of transmission.

Despite apparently abundant combination antiretroviral therapy (cART) options in high-income countries, an Australian modeling study suggests that people could exhaust currently available options within their expected lifespan. Using up cART options would, in turn, limit life expectancy.

cART has greatly extended life expectancy, but most studies still find that HIV-positive people have shorter life expectancy than the general population. One little-explored variable in the life-expectancy equation is how fast a person with HIV uses up cART options because regimens fail virologically or cannot be tolerated.

AUSTRALIA is way behind the US and Europe in protecting medical workers from sharp objects, says a former US nurse who contracted HIV and hepatitis C through a needle injury.

Dr Karen Daley, in Melbourne to attend a nursing conference, says it is "surprising and distressing" that Australia does not have safety regulations.

The US made safety devices mandatory in 2001, and the UK and European Union also have regulations.

For activist and community leader Kapul Robert* from Papua New Guinea (PNG) accessing HIV services is a constant challenge. “Papua New Guinea has a law that says sodomy is illegal and this law is contributing to the high-levels of stigma existing in society for both men who have sex with men (MSM) and transgender people.”

Almost all Pacific nations—and many countries across Asia-Pacific— have examples of laws and practices that criminalize people living with HIV or people most at risk of infection such as MSM, sex workers, transgender people, migrants and prisoners.

Background: The resurgence of infectious syphilis in men who have sex with men (MSM) has been documented worldwide; however, HIV coinfection and syphilis reinfections in MSM in inner Sydney have not been published.

Methods: For all laboratory syphilis notifications assessed as a newly notified case or reinfection, a questionnaire was sent to the requesting physician seeking demographic data and disease classification. Sex of partner and HIV status were collected for all infectious syphilis notifications in men received from 1 April 2006 to March 2011.

'Your Body Blueprint', a new campaign for people living with HIV has just been launched by AFAO.

Based around an interactive website, the campaign is designed to encourage and support people living with HIV to lead healthier lives, reduce the risk of illness, and enhance their quality of life.

Despite antiretroviral treatments enabling many people with HIV to approach HIV as a manageable chronic disease, various other conditions (such as those related to cardiovascular, liver, kidney and bone health, amongst others) continue to challenge their health and complicate their management of both HIV and the other conditions.

The combination of ageing and long-term HIV treatment does not negatively affect CD 4 T-cell counts, an Australian study has concluded.

The study, published in the April edition of HIV Medicine, looked at the long-term changes in CD4 counts of a total of 892 people with HIV who had been on combination antiretroviral treatment (cART) for a period of five years or more.

The research aimed to test the hypothesis that, assuming natural ageing leads to a long-term decline in the immune system due to low-grade chronic immune activation and inflammation, this may also cause larger or earlier reduction in CD4 cells HIV-positive people as they grow older.

Aging and duration of combination antiretroviral therapy (cART) did not affect CD4-cell changes in an Australian cohort taking long-term effective cART.

Natural aging may promote a long-term decline in the immune system because of low-grade chronic inflammation and immune activations, the Australian team hypothesized. Thus you might expected to see a greater or earlier drop in CD4 cells in aging HIV-positive people.

To test that hypothesis, the researchers analyzed 37,916 CD4 measurements in 892 people who were virologically stable while taking long-term cART. The investigators used linear mixed models to estimate average CD4-cell changes after people completed 5 years of cART. Combined follow-up measured 9753 patient-years.