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Zimbabwe lacks AIDS drugs to expand treatment: official Harare (AFP) July 11, 2010 Zimbabwe may not have enough anti-AIDS drugs to comply with World Health Organisation recommendations on providing treatment to people with HIV, a top health official said Sunday. Zimbabwe is currently treating about 200,000 people whose immune systems have been severely weakened by the disease, but the WHO recommends that treatment should start earlier. "The number of people in need of treatment will double if we follow the World Health Organisation plan," Tsitsi Mutasa Apollo, co-ordinator of HIV treatment in the health ministry, said in the state-run Sunday Mail. "We are likely to experience more drug shortages," said Apollo. The new guidelines would mean about 500,000 people need treatment, the paper said. Zimbabwe's prevention and treatment campaign relies on donor funding, after a near decade of economic crisis also which crippled health services. The country imposes an AIDS levy on workers to fund drug procurement for over 1.6 million people living with the virus. Last year HIV infected 13.7 percent of adults, down from a high of 33 percent in 1999. The decline has been attributed to donor-backed prevention campaigns which promotes safe sex and discourages multiple sexual partners.
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Breakthrough antibodies neutralize most known AIDS strains Washington (AFP) July 8, 2010 US researchers have discovered two powerful antibodies that neutralize more than 90 percent of all known strains of the HIV virus in the lab, new research released Thursday showed. NIH-led scientists discovered the antibodies known as VRCO1 and VRCO2 that prevent most HIV strains from infecting human cells. The find is a potential breakthrough for advancing HIV vaccine design, and antibody t ... read more |
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