Software Vault: The Diamond Collection/The Diamond Collection (Software Vault)(Digital Impact).ISO/cdr16/ad950221.zip/AD950221.TXT

Text File | 1995-02-21 | 12KB | 206 lines

                     AIDS Daily Summary
                      February 21, 1995

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) National AIDS
Clearinghouse makes available the following information as a public
service only. Providing this information does not constitute endorsement
by the CDC, the CDC Clearinghouse, or any other organization. Reproduction
of this text is encouraged; however, copies may not be sold, and the CDC
Clearinghouse should be cited as the source of this information.
Copyright 1995, Information, Inc., Bethesda, MD


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"Immature Immune Cells May Sustain Brunt of H.I.V. Attack"
"Thailand Starts Testing Anti-AIDS Vaccine"
"D.C. Service Agencies, Clients Fear for Future"
"Leaders of Gay Blacks Emphasize Local Issues"
"Indonesia's Streetwise War on AIDS Has the World Watching"
"HIV Revenge Killer Dies of Disease"
"Sex Getting Safer in the Age of AIDS"
"Apoptosis Occurs Predominantly in Bystander Cells and Not in
Productively Infected Cells of HIV- and SIV-Infected Lymph Nodes"
"Drug Abuse Treatment Experience and HIV Risk Behaviors among
Active Drug Injectors in Ohio"
"Global HIV/AIDS: A Strategy for U.S. Leadership"
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"Immature Immune Cells May Sustain Brunt of H.I.V. Attack"
New York Times (02/21/95) P. C3;  Angier, Natalie
     Researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have
announced that the population of the body's immune cells most
ravaged by HIV is a group called naive T cells.  The scientists
found that naive T cells are extremely vulnerable to the impact
of HIV and that their numbers decline significantly during the
course of disease progression from infection to full-blown AIDS.
The loss of naive cells might explain why HIV-infected
individuals become increasingly vulnerable to new opportunistic
diseases--they have lost the immune cells most capable of
learning new tricks.  If confirmed, the new findings could
influence decisions of what sort of experimental therapies may
work best for various subgroups of patients.  "We'd predict that
those individuals with few or no naive T cells won't respond to
vaccination," said Dr. Mario Roederer, an immunologist at
Stanford.  Roederer also said that the results suggest that most
of the immune anomalies and disturbances observed during the
course of AIDS infection may be the result of the shifting ratio
of cell types.

"Thailand Starts Testing Anti-AIDS Vaccine"
Reuters (02/21/95)
     The Thai Ministry of Public Health, working with Mahidol
University, injected 30 recovering intravenous drug users with
the experimental vaccine GP-120 on Tuesday to see if it protected
them against AIDS.  Sricharoen Migasena, head of research at
Mahidol's Department of Clinical Tropical Medicine, said she
thought the vaccine from Genentech Inc. would be "suitable" and
"beneficial to our country."  She explained that the study used
recovering drug users because they were believed to be at "low
risk" for HIV infection.  She also said that although the strain
of HIV treated by the vaccine is not the most common in Thailand,
it is "the predominant strain" in intravenous drug users.

"D.C. Service Agencies, Clients Fear for Future"
Washington Post (02/20/95) P. D1;  Constable, Pamela
     With city officials still deciding which programs to cut and by
how much, many nonprofit agencies in Washington, D.C., have no
idea whether they will be saved or spared.  The District's
Department of Human Services must cut $68 million from its
billion-dollar budget, and aides to Mayor Marion Barry said last
week that they will eliminate funding for many independent groups
that serve the needy.  Three nonprofit service areas being
affected by the city's budget crisis are programs for the
homeless, facilities for people with AIDS, and programs for
minority or disadvantaged youth.  "At this point, the city owes
us $1.4 million, including $688,000 that is 45 days past due,"
said James Graham, director of the Whitman-Walker Clinic, which
provides medical care, counseling, and housing for thousands of
people who are HIV-positive or who have AIDS.  Graham said that
city officials promised to send the clinic a check for $250,000
this week, and that nonprofit organizations realize that they
cannot be exempt from cutbacks.  "But this is money we have
already spent, and in effect we have been loaning it to the city.
We need it back," he added.

"Leaders of Gay Blacks Emphasize Local Issues"
New York Times (02/20/95) P. A13;  Dunlap, David W.
     Organizers who are gay and black often find the most challenging
arena to be their own neighborhoods, where pastors condemn
homosexuality and youths seem beyond the reach of AIDS-prevention
messages.  Neighborhood concerns predominated this past weekend
at a three-day conference, which was sponsored by the Black Gay
and Lesbian Leadership Forum.  Members also discussed how to
communicate more effectively with younger people who are at risk
of HIV-infection.  "The attitude is that it can't happen to me or
to anyone I know," said Latoris Jordan, a medical assistant and
physical therapist from Chicago.  Black gay leaders acknowledged
the involvement of many churches in the fight against AIDS, but
said that conservative pastors who preached against homosexuality
still posed a considerable hurdle.  "This whole community is
going to be dead by the time you get them all away from 'it's an
abomination,'" said Mayor Kenneth E. Reeves of Cambridge, Mass.

"Indonesia's Streetwise War on AIDS Has the World Watching"
Washington Post (02/20/95) P. A3;  Stevens, Jane E.
     Tuti Parwati, an Indonesian physician and AIDS researcher, is
trying to slow the spread of AIDS in her country.  With a
population of 185 million, Indonesia is the fourth most populous
country in the world and has one of the lowest rates of HIV.  By
the end of November 1994, 266 people were reported to be
HIV-infected and 66 of those had AIDS.  Parwati heads the Citra
Usadha Indonesian Foundation, under which 40 employees and
volunteers work with those at highest risk--such as prostitutes,
homosexuals, and students in tourist academies.  Parwati's street
workers distribute condoms, referral cards for medications for
sexually transmitted diseases and for a test for HIV.  She
created her program to work through existing structures and
mobilized their leaders to make HIV prevention a priority.
"Parwati's program model is among the most innovative in the
world," said Tom Coates, chairman of the steering committee for
social and behavioral studies at the World Health Organization's
Global Program on AIDS.  Programs based on her models have been
expanded to more than 30 communities across the country that work
with other high-risk groups such as truckers, sailors, and oil
workers.

"HIV Revenge Killer Dies of Disease"
Chicago Tribune (02/18/95) P. 1-16
     Michael Lupo, the serial killer who strangled four homosexuals in
revenge for contracting HIV, has died in prison from an
AIDS-related illness, said prison officials in the northern
English county of Durham.  In 1986, Lupo, who was also a
homosexual, went on an eight-week killing spree after learning he
was HIV-positive.  He was jailed for life after admitting to the
murders and two other attempted killings.

"Sex Getting Safer in the Age of AIDS"
Philadelphia Inquirer (02/18/95) P. A2;  Vedantam, Shankar
     Sexual encounters are becoming safer in the United States,
reported the authors of the "Sex in America" study at the annual
meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of
Science.  "People are responding the fact that sex can be a
life-and-death question," said Joel A. Feinleib, research
associate at the Harris School of Public Policy Studies at the
University of Chicago.  Promiscuous people who are at the highest
risk of acquiring sexually transmitted diseases, such as AIDS,
have tripled their condom use, the researchers report.  The fact
that sexually promiscuous people were cutting back on their
prowling, selecting partners more carefully, and practicing safer
sex reflects how the AIDS epidemic has changed America's sexual
mores.  Of those people with the riskiest behavior--between 11
and 20 partners in the last year--78 percent reported making
changes in their sexual practices.

"Apoptosis Occurs Predominantly in Bystander Cells and Not in
Productively Infected Cells of HIV- and SIV-Infected Lymph Nodes"
Nature Medicine (02/95) Vol. 1, No. 2, P. 129;  Finkel, T.H.;
Tudor-Williams, G.;  Banda, N.K. et al.
     Finkel et al. found an increase in the percentage of apoptotic
cells among circulating CD4 and CD8 T cells of HIV-positive
individuals.  There was also an increase in frequency of
apoptosis with disease progression.  Apoptosis, or programmed
cell death, is a regulated mechanism of cell suicide that is
critical to many physiological processes, including T-cell
development and normal immune function.  Using in situ labeling
of lymph nodes from HIV-infected children and SIV-infected
macaques, the researchers determined that apoptosis occurs mainly
in bystander cells--not in the productively infected cells
themselves.  The therapeutic implications of the findings are
that rational drug therapy may involve a combination of agents
targeting viral replication in infected cells and apoptosis of
uninfected cells.

"Drug Abuse Treatment Experience and HIV Risk Behaviors among
Active Drug Injectors in Ohio"
American Journal of Public Health (01/95) Vol. 85, No. 1, P. 105;
Siegal, Harvey A.;  Carlson, Robert G.;  Falck, Russel S. et al.
     Siegal et al. compared the sociodemographic characteristics and
HIV risk behaviors of intravenous drug users who had undergone
drug abuse treatment during the past five years and those who had
not been treated.  They studied 2001 active injection drug users
who participated in the National Institute on Drug Abuse's
National AIDS Demonstration Research projects in Cleveland,
Columbus, Cincinnati, and Dayton, Ohio.  Almost 43 percent
reported having been treated during the previous five years.  The
length of involvement with drugs, higher injection frequencies,
increased legal problems, and higher levels of HIV risk behaviors
are factors associated with a history of drug treatment.  The
researchers concluded that effective HIV risk reduction education
is an urgent priority in drug abuse treatment programs.

"Global HIV/AIDS: A Strategy for U.S. Leadership"
Health Affairs (Winter 1994) Vol. 13, No. 5, P. 256
     In August 1994, the Center for Strategic and International
Studies (CSIS) released "Global HIV/AIDS: A Strategy for U.S.
Leadership."  The report emphasized that the country "has a vital
stake in slowing...the spread of HIV/AIDS in the world."  The
main barriers to effective strategies against the epidemic are
stigmatization and discrimination, the CSIS wrote.  The report
concluded that the United States should lead the fight against
AIDS "by example," for example by monitoring HIV/AIDS-related
human rights violations "committed in the name of prevention,"
targeting HIV/AIDS prevention programs at various ages and
populations, and refitting prevention strategies to address the
special needs of women.