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The former U.S. president spoke to an audience of mostly African scientists, health professionals and AIDS activists. But he addressed his most pointed remarks to U.S. lawmakers and taxpayers. He drew enthusiastic applause when he said this is not the time to cut back funding for the battle against sexually-transmitted diseases. "During lean budget times, the United States and the developing world must set priorities, and there is no greater priority than saving human life," he said. Mr. Bush was showered with gifts and honors during his one day visit to Ethiopia for his leadership in creating PEPFAR, the President's Emergency Program for AIDS Relief.
The 10-year, $39 billion program is considered the largest ever initiative dedicated to fighting a disease. At a time when many people in the United States are urging cuts in government programs to control federal spending, the former president cautioned that reducing successful humanitarian programs could diminish America's standing in the world. "I know that during moments of economic hardship, there can be a temptation for Americans to disengage from the world. But we cannot retreat. We cannot afford to falter when we're needed most. Isolationism is always short sighted. It's always a mistake. It can lead always lead to greater hardship and despair," he said.
Mr. Bush warned that an American withdrawal from its leadership role in the fight against human suffering would leave a void that could be filled by extremists. "Suffering from abroad can be the distant thunder of a storm gathering against us all. Americans and Africans face a common enemy in the despair of disease. It is hopelessness that aids extremists, so we aim to provide hope and compassion by standing with others as they stand against human suffering," he said.
Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi presented Mr. Bush with his government's Outstanding Leadership award for PEPFAR's contribution to improving health. About 3,000 delegates attended the opening session of what is to be a five-day continental conference. Organizers say they expect double that number to attend.
Source
Obama acknowledged that while the rate of new HIV/AIDS infections has decreased elsewhere in the world, not so in the United States. “The infection rate here has been holding steady for over a decade,” Obama said at an event at George Washington University. “There are communities in this country being devastated, still, by this disease.” “When new infections among young black gay men increase by nearly 50 percent in three years, we need to do more to show them that their lives matter,” Obama said. The president noted that 1.2 million Americans are living with HIV.
The statistics cited by Obama come from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), but the president did not include information from the CDC that reveals more about the demographics of people who have HIV in the United States, including:
*The number of people living with HIV infection in the United States (HIV prevalence) is higher than ever before. The CDC has estimated that more than 1 million (1,106,400) adults and adolescents were living with HIV infection in the United States at the end of 2006, the most recent year for which national prevalence estimates are available. This represents an increase of approximately 11 percent from the previous estimate in 2003.
*HIV disproportionately affects certain populations. Men who have sex with men (MSM), blacks/African Americans, and Hispanic/Latinos are the groups most affected by HIV infection.
*MSM represent approximately 2 percent of the U.S. population. However, MSM have an HIV diagnosis rate more than 44 times that of other men, and more than 40 times that of women.
*MSM account for more than half of all new HIV infections in the United States and nearly 30,000 MSM are newly infected with HIV each year.
*MSM is the only risk group with increasing annual numbers of new HIV infections.
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How about we stop borrowing money from China so we can waste it on bullshit like this
How about we stop borrowing money from China so we can waste it on bullshit like this
Did you 'really' just call spending money on AIDS research... bullshit?
Trauma among women infected with HIV is helping drive the epidemic, according to two new studies from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) and Harvard Medical School. That trauma can include physical violence, sexual abuse and other forms of childhood and adult trauma. Edward Machtinger, director of the Women's HIV Program at UCSF, says many women in the program don't do very well, despite good medical care. Some stayed with abusive partners, or continued using illegal drugs. Others just didn't take their medicine.
Using in-depth interviews with patients in his clinic, combined with data from their medical records, Machtinger found that women were at particular risk if they had experienced recent traumatic events - specifically physical or sexual abuse. "We found that recent trauma had a startlingly high association with both treatment failure as well as being in risky situations for further transmitting their virus to their partners," he said.
To see whether his small group of just over 100 patients was typical, Machtinger also looked at 29 previous studies. By mathematically combining them in what is called a meta-analysis, he found that traumatic events and post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, were much more common among HIV-positive women than women in general. "For example, over 60 percent of HIV-positive women reported lifetime sexual abuse. And that is far higher, over five times higher, than [the] 12 percent reporting such abuse in the general population."
This research was limited to women in the United States. Scientists generally don't like to extrapolate beyond their data, but Machtinger says there is no reason to believe that the link between trauma and HIV doesn't apply everywhere there is an AIDS epidemic, regardless of gender or geography. "In other words, I believe that trauma is the key to the HIV epidemic, not only in this country, but in every country."
So now, at the Women's HIV program in San Francisco, Machtinger says they are focusing on trauma prevention and recovery. "Trauma should be a core component of the care of HIV-positive women, right alongside measuring CD-4 counts, viral loads, and helping women take their HIV medications." Machtinger adds that HIV/AIDS treatment that also addresses a patients physical or emotional traumas can be more effective and significantly less expensive than conventional treatment programs.
Source
AIDS & WOMEN...
Study: Trauma Fuels HIV Epidemic in Women
March 27, 2012 - Physical, sexual abuse put patients at greater risk
Trauma among women infected with HIV is helping drive the epidemic, according to two new studies from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) and Harvard Medical School. That trauma can include physical violence, sexual abuse and other forms of childhood and adult trauma. Edward Machtinger, director of the Women's HIV Program at UCSF, says many women in the program don't do very well, despite good medical care. Some stayed with abusive partners, or continued using illegal drugs. Others just didn't take their medicine.
Using in-depth interviews with patients in his clinic, combined with data from their medical records, Machtinger found that women were at particular risk if they had experienced recent traumatic events - specifically physical or sexual abuse. "We found that recent trauma had a startlingly high association with both treatment failure as well as being in risky situations for further transmitting their virus to their partners," he said.
To see whether his small group of just over 100 patients was typical, Machtinger also looked at 29 previous studies. By mathematically combining them in what is called a meta-analysis, he found that traumatic events and post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, were much more common among HIV-positive women than women in general. "For example, over 60 percent of HIV-positive women reported lifetime sexual abuse. And that is far higher, over five times higher, than [the] 12 percent reporting such abuse in the general population."
This research was limited to women in the United States. Scientists generally don't like to extrapolate beyond their data, but Machtinger says there is no reason to believe that the link between trauma and HIV doesn't apply everywhere there is an AIDS epidemic, regardless of gender or geography. "In other words, I believe that trauma is the key to the HIV epidemic, not only in this country, but in every country."
So now, at the Women's HIV program in San Francisco, Machtinger says they are focusing on trauma prevention and recovery. "Trauma should be a core component of the care of HIV-positive women, right alongside measuring CD-4 counts, viral loads, and helping women take their HIV medications." Machtinger adds that HIV/AIDS treatment that also addresses a patients physical or emotional traumas can be more effective and significantly less expensive than conventional treatment programs.
Source
In low- and middle-income countries, drug resistance stood at 6.8 percent in 2010, the WHO said in its first-ever report on the matter released ahead of the International AIDS Conference in the US capital July 22-27. "That is a level that we sort of expected. It is not dramatic but we clearly need to look very carefully on how this would evolve further," WHO AIDS chief Gottfried Hirnschall said in an interview. Drug resistance can occur when the virus mutates naturally, when treatment is interrupted or patients take the medications incorrectly. The 6.8 percent figure relates to the level of HIV drug resistance transmitted from one person to another, meaning those people were found to be resistant to the first-line of therapy they tried. The other main type of resistance is one that develops in a patient who takes medications irregularly.
Since many more people in the developing world are now receiving antiretroviral drugs, experts have been closely monitoring to see whether a surge in drug resistance would accompany the increased coverage. Some eight million people in low- and middle-income countries were being treated with antiretrovirals last year, up 20 percent from 2010 according to a separate report by UNAIDS released Wednesday. High-income countries, many of which began widescale treatment for HIV years earlier and used single or dual therapies that can also encourage resistance, face higher rates of resistance, from eight to 14 percent, said the study.
However, those rates have largely leveled off or decreased over time, Hirnschall noted. "What we have also seen in these countries is it has stabilized or plateaued while we are still seeing a slight increase in low- and middle-income countries," he told AFP. In 12 of the low- and middle-income countries included in the study, health care facilities lost contact with up to 38 percent of people who began treatment. When people interrupt or stop their treatment altogether, "this not only means that they are themselves more likely to become sick, it also increases the likelihood that drug resistance will emerge and the resistant virus could be transmitted to others," the report said.
More HIV drug resistance creeps higher: WHO - Yahoo! News
