Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome

Disheartened by the failures of vaccines and microbicides in blocking HIV transmission, some AIDS researchers are now touting a third possibility: using existing HIV drugs prophylactically. By next year, as many as 15,000 people worldwide will be enrolled in trials to test the concept -- more than are enrolled in all vaccine and microbicide trials combined -- according to a report issued Sunday at the International AIDS Conference in Mexico City. There are seven trials underway or planned.

Low doses of human growth hormone can reverse some of the abnormal fat distribution caused by HIV therapy, lowering the risk of cardiovascular disease, but the treatment may produce an unnecessary risk for those who have early stages of diabetes, researchers said Sunday. The hormone produced good results but would have to be used carefully to avoid inducing diabetes, said Dr. Steven Grinspoon of the Harvard Medical School, lead author of the paper.

Federal officials have been underestimating the number of new HIV infections in the United States by 40% every year for more than a decade, a finding that indicates the U.S. epidemic is much worse than thought, researchers said Saturday. Using sophisticated testing to identify new infections, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention concluded that there are about 56,300 new infections each year, not the 40,000 figure that has been gospel for so long.

President Bush signed a sweeping measure Wednesday that provides $48 billion to combat AIDS and other diseases globally and that also ends a long-standing U.S. ban on foreign visitors and immigrants who are HIV-positive. The travel ban, approved in 1993, was seen by opponents as an anachronism from a period of hysteria surrounding gays. Its repeal, however, does not remove all U.S. travel impediments.

The number of AIDS deaths worldwide dropped 10% in 2007 because of increasing access to treatment, as did the number of new infections in children, the United Nations reported Tuesday. Condom use and prevention efforts increased in many countries and adolescent sexual intercourse declined in some of the most heavily affected regions, the report says. "In a surprisingly short period of time, there has been a tripling of prevention efforts in some countries," said Dr.

Nearly 3 million people in developing countries are now receiving antiretroviral drugs to treat AIDS, a treatment goal that health authorities had hoped to meet two years ago, according to a new report released Monday. About 1 million people received the life-saving drugs for the first time during 2007, according to the report from UNAIDS, the World Health Organization and UNICEF. During the same period, however, an additional 2.

A bipartisan coalition in the House voted Wednesday to significantly expand a popular program aimed at combating HIV and AIDS around the world, renewing the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief by authorizing $50 billion -- $20 billion more than the White House requested -- over five years. "There is a moral imperative to combat this epidemic," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco). "Few crises have called out more for sustained, constructive American leadership."

The two-decade search for an AIDS vaccine is in crisis after two field tests of the most promising contender not only did not protect people from the virus but may have put them at increased risk of becoming infected. The trials, which enrolled volunteers on four continents, have spurred intense scientific inquiry and unprecedented soul-searching as researchers try to make sense of what happened and assess whether they should have seen it coming.

After crossing Africa from west to east and back, the central issues that followed President Bush on his tour all came together Wednesday in the white stucco Osu Castle here on the Atlantic shoreline. With gusto, the president declared "that's baloney" to the notion that the United States was preparing to establish military bases in Africa. "Or, as we say in Texas, that's bull," Bush said at a news conference with Ghanaian President John Kufuor.

With old and young providing testament to the success of a U.S.-funded effort to fight AIDS, President Bush on Sunday called for Congress to renew the program quickly and said that helping Africa was in the national and moral interests of the United States. The program provides readier access to antiretroviral drugs, easing the impact of the disease. But it also puts a strong focus on premarital sexual abstinence, drawing criticism in the U.S.