Send a Message to Obama

posted: 29/01/2009

Where's the Cure is an appeal for change to new USA President Obama to redouble efforts to find a cure for HIV.

By adding your own photograph and message to the website, a book of the photographs and messages calling for change and redoubled efforts to find a cure, will be presented to president Obama, 100 days after he took office, on April 30, 2009.  

What to do to join in

• Make a sign saying: Where’s the Cure?  Be inventive with your signs - write it anywhere, but they warn you about not damaging or defacing other people's property. If you can't think of a unique solution, you can always download one of Amfar's own signs. View the gallery for inspiration and to see how inventive, creative and passionate for HIV change people can be. Think not just of producing a cool, edgy Where's the Cure sign but also of an interesting place to photograph it - at the top of the Wheel (the Manchester Eye), in front of the Bentham Tower, floating past the HIV Beacon of Hope along the Rochdale Canal at Canal Street, at the top of Blackpool Tower, in an 80s goth bedsit beside a poster of The Cure .....

• Take a picture of you and your Where’s the Cure? sign.

• register and upload it to their gallery, where you can vote on your favourites and view the other images in the gallery.

• You can check how progress is going. The Where's the Cure? book will be ready just before April 30.

Visit Where's the Cure and add your voice to the international calls to president Obama to act.

What Clinics Will Now Prescribe

posted: 10/12/2008

From 1 January 2009 prescribing at HIV clinics in Greater Manchester will change. The HIV clinics will then only prescribe HIV drugs and those for their side effects.

All other medication - for depression, sexual dysfunction, skin conditions, everything else - will have to be prescribed by a GP.

Here are the details sent to us by Greater Manchester Sexual Health Network.

Medicines for hospital prescriptions for HIV+ve patients
On 1 January 2009 all clinics providing HIV care for HIV+ patients will stop prescribing primary care medication. This is because it is not clinically safe to continue to do so and it is important that all patients, regardless of their diagnosis, are treated equitably and access primary care medication through a GP.
 

Drugs that will be prescribed by GU and HIV clinics include:

• All antiretrovirals
• Prophylactic antibiotics (Septrin, Dapsone, Atovoquone, Pentamidine etc) plus other drugs for opportunistic infection treatment (Valganciclovir, TB/MAI therapy etc.)
• Antifungals
• Aciclovir/Valaciclovir
• Antiemetics and antidiarrhoeals (e.g. Metoclopramide, Loperamide)
• Short term and/or urgent prescriptions (including antibiotics) on hospital outpatient scripts or FP10s if medicines are needed out of hours
• Contraception as usual 

Clinical colleagues should continue to encourage patients to register with a GP and to disclose their status to their GP. This will enable GPs and GU consultants to share information about patients care.

Primary Care Working Group of Greater Manchester Sexual Health Network                              Version 1.3 (5 December 2008) Review date: June 2009 Enquiries to: 0161 219 9468

Problems with prescribing?

If the new prescribing arrangements are causing you problems please contact our services team support@ght.org.uk or by phone on 0161 274 4499 

Pimping those T-cells

posted: 11/11/2008

Researchers have created souped-up T-cells which are far better at homing in on HIV than the natural "killer" T-cells our bodies produce.

Pimped up T-cells have a lab-made molecular receptor which gives the body an edge against a virus. It is based on one from someone whose immune system is far better than most people's at spotting and destroying HIV. 

One reason HIV gets around our immune system defences, as well as around the drugs and vaccines, is the virus's quick-change artist behaviour – because it mutates so rapidly, HIV quickly changes its cloak and so evades attacks. But some parts of HIV are so vital to its functioning that changes result in dead or much less damaging viruses. The pimped T cells target one of these key bits of protein.

The virus normally keeps this hidden from our immune system. But when HIV infects cells, small bits of protein get trapped on the surface, acting as warning flags to the immune system. The problem with our natural killer T-cells is they are rubbish at spotting the protein – the pimped T-cells however home in on the target and then destroy the infected cell - thus preventing the virus from spreading.

The pimped T-cells have proved effective in laboratory tests using human cell cultures – it will now be tested in a USA clinical trial of 35 patients with advanced HIV infection that is due to start next summer.

One pitfall could be that the cells prove too strong for their own good, because there is a chance they could recognise and attack human proteins.

If this new appraoch works it will be some years before it is released generally. Treating patients will involve taking a blood sample and adding an engineered virus containing genes for the improved T cell receptor. The patient's own T cells then take up the genes and so are equipped with the improved receptor. These cells are then injected back into the patient. It's a method that depends on advanced medical facilities and money - it is not likely to be affordable or practical in the developing world.

Sources New Scientist Guardian 

Join HIV Treatments Survey

posted: 19/09/2008

Join HIV Treatments Survey - even if you are not on treatment!

This is a survey for people with HIV. National Aids Manual (NAM) would like to hear what you think about starting treatment:

• If you've never taken any HIV drugs
• If you are just about to start treatment
• If you've recently started treatment
• If you've been on treatment for quite a while
• If you've stopped treatment

It should take you no more than 5 - 10 minutes to answer all the questions.

We think it is really important that people living with HIV get the opportunity to have their say and help shape developments in HIV treatment and care. By taking some of your time to complete this survey you will play an important part in making sure people with HIV have the right care and support.

So, whether you have been on treatment for a long time, started on treatment yesterday, have never been on treatment or are just starting to think about it, then we look forward to hearing from you and thank you for taking the time to answer these questions.

This is an independent survey and is not sponsored by a pharmaceutical company - it is intended to improve understanding of starting HIV treatment.

This survey closes on October 26th 2008. Some of the findings from this survey will be presented at the Ninth International Congress on Drug Therapy in HIV Infection in November.
START THE SURVEY