Good for Treatment-Experienced Youngsters
posted: 10/11/2009
More excellent news from France, this time for children and young people people with drug-resistant HIV due to taking many HIV drugs – you can reach an undetectable viral load with a new three drug combination - the results are almost as good as starting treatment for the first time.
At the end of October news of the same combination's success with adults appeared.
The French study involved twelve children taking a combination of HIV treatment that included darunavir / ritonavir (Prezista), etravirine (Intelence), and raltegravir (Isentress). All twelve children had extensive resistance to anti-HIV drugs.
Nevertheless, after a year of treatment, all but one had a viral load below 400 copies/ml, and average CD4 cell count had increased from 124 cells/mm3 to over 500 cells/mm3.
None of the children developed a serious HIV-related illness or died, and only one stopped treatment because of side-effects.
The researchers describe these results as “remarkable”.
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