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New microbicide gel reduces woman's risk of being infected with HIV, genital herpes

Today at the XVIII International AIDS Conference in Vienna, Austria, members of the International Rectal Microbicide Advocates (IRMA) and thousands of other HIV advocates and scientists cheered a long-awaited, much anticipated success in the quest for new HIV prevention technologies. Researchers announced that a vaginal gel has been shown to significantly reduce a woman's risk of being infected with HIV and genital herpes

20 Jul 2010

T-SPOT.TB test predicts TB infected persons better than TST: Study

The authors of a recent study published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine concluded that the T-SPOT.TB test is better than the tuberculin skin test at predicting which patients will develop active TB.

20 Jul 2010

Abbott presents 48-week PROGRESS study results at 28th International AIDS Conference

Abbott today presented 48-week findings comparing an HIV regimen of its protease inhibitor (PI), Kaletra® (lopinavir/ritonavir), and Merck's integrase inhibitor, Isentress® (raltegravir), to a traditional HIV regimen of Kaletra and the nucleotide/nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NRTIs) in Truvada® (tenofovir and emtricitabine) in antiretroviral-naive adult patients. Efficacy data were collected over the first 48 weeks of the 96-week PROGRESS (PROtease/InteGRasE Simplification Study) study.

20 Jul 2010

Infants in African countries receive minimum help to reduce risk of mother-to-child HIV transmission: Study

Only about half of infants born to HIV-infected mothers in some African countries receive a minimum preventive dose of the drug nevirapine to help reduce the risk of mother-to-child HIV transmission, according to a study in the July 21 issue of JAMA, a theme issue on HIV/AIDS.

20 Jul 2010

International AIDS conference focuses on HIV prevention, U.S. poverty-infection link

Speeches and studies at the international HIV/AIDS conference, now underway in Vienna, were covered by a variety of news outlets.

20 Jul 2010

AIDS 2010 opens: Leaders weigh in on global HIV/AIDS funding; Clinton, Gates on efficiency

The six-day International AIDS Conference-AIDS 2010 kicked off Sunday in Vienna, Austria "amid resurgent fears that advances in the 29-year war against the disease were threatened by a slump in funding," Agence France-Presse reports.

20 Jul 2010

FDA joins Tox21 collaboration for improved chemical screening

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences National Toxicology Program (NTP) and the National Institute of Health Chemical Genomics Center (NCGC) welcome the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to the Tox21 collaboration. The Tox21 collaboration merges federal agency resources (research, funding and testing tools) to develop ways to more effectively predict how chemicals will affect human health and the environment. The collaboration was established in 2008 to develop models that will be able to better predict how chemicals will affect humans. FDA will provide additional expertise and chemical safety information to improve current chemical testing methods.

20 Jul 2010

PSI showcases evidence-based HIV prevention methods at International AIDS Conference

Technical staff from PSI, a leading global health organization operating in more than 60 countries around the world, are currently attending the 18th International AIDS Conference in Vienna to showcase PSI's innovative, evidence-based HIV prevention methods, which have helped to successfully avert more than one billion cases of HIV infection over the past 40 years.

20 Jul 2010

Benefits of drug L-methionine for neurogenic bladder disorders unclear

It is unclear whether patients with neurogenic bladder disorders benefit from the drug L-methionine. The only study currently available provides neither proof of benefit nor proof of harm. This is the result of a report published by the German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG) on 12 July 2010.

20 Jul 2010

A look into HIV related issues

According to a report from US health officials, the poorer neighborhoods of America's cities harbour at least 1 in 50 heterosexual adults infected with HIV. These figures are more than elsewhere in the country. According to the research team from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), being poor and getting HIV are linked and this was regardless of race or ethnicity.

19 Jul 2010

First Edition: July 19, 2010

Today's headlines include the latest news regarding the politics of implementing health reform as well as developments from the international AIDS conference now underway in Vienna.

19 Jul 2010

Phase 2 CUBICIN study for prosthetic joint infections meets primary endpoint

Cubist Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a leading acute care therapeutics company, today announced that its Phase 2 safety study of CUBICIN (daptomycin for injection) in the treatment of prosthetic joint infections caused by certain Gram positive pathogens met its study objectives. This study was a first-of-its-kind randomized controlled Phase 2 trial studying anti-infective therapy in the setting of 2-stage surgery for the replacement of infected prosthetic hip or knee joints.

19 Jul 2010

Phase II data on Genetic Immunity's DermaVir vaccine to be presented at XVIII International AIDS Conference

Genetic Immunity, a US/Hungarian biopharmaceutical company developing nanomedicine-based immunotherapies for HIV/AIDS and other chronic diseases, is releasing Phase II data on the Company's novel DermaVir therapeutic vaccine for HIV/AIDS during the XVIII International AIDS Conference this week in Vienna, Austria. DermaVir, the first dendritic cell-targeting topical HIV vaccine candidate, employs nanotechnology to induce multi-faceted and long-lived immune responses capable of eliminating HIV infected cells.

19 Jul 2010

ViroStatics to present VS411 Phase II dose-ranging trial data at International AIDS Conference in Vienna

ViroStatics, a US/Italian biopharmaceutical company developing innovative immunotherapies for HIV/AIDS and other chronic diseases, is releasing Phase II data from a randomized, dose-ranging trial of VS411, the Company's novel combination product for treating HIV/AIDS, during the XVII International AIDS Conference this week in Vienna, Austria.

19 Jul 2010

FIT Biotech to present results of FIT-06 Phase II clinical trial at XVIII International AIDS 2010 Conference

FIT Biotech, a privately held biotechnology company developing novel, proprietary immunotherapies for HIV/AIDS and other viral diseases, announced results today from a Phase II clinical trial. The company's immunomodulator FIT-06 showed unprecedented long-term reductions in viral load (approximately 0.5 log) and statistically significant CD4 cell count increases in HIV-infected, previously untreated patients. The effect lasted longer than two years in the absence of any anti-retroviral therapy.

19 Jul 2010

Effective AIDS treatment but poor accessibility: Report from International AIDS conference 2010

At the 18th AIDS conference 2010 in Vienna, Julio Montaner — the President of the International AIDS Society and Chairman of the AIDS 2010 conference said this Sunday that the G-8 countries were not doing enough to ensure treatment of all people infected with HIV and AIDS. He said, “This is a very serious deficit… Let's rejoice in the fact that today we have treatments that work ... what we need is the political will to go the extra mile to deliver universal access.”

18 Jul 2010

Cash incentives cut down HIV transmission: World Bank Studies

A cash incentive has been found to lower the rates of HIV and sexually transmitted disease transmission among Malawian and Tanzanian youths revealed the World Bank, this Sunday. There were two studies undertaken to make this connection.

18 Jul 2010

New tactics for repelling, controlling disease-carrying insects

In the battle between insect predators and their prey, chemical signals called kairomones serve as an early-warning system. Pervasively emitted by the predators, the compounds are detected by their prey, and can even trigger adaptations, such a change in body size or armor, that help protect the prey. But as widespread as kairomones are in the insect world, their chemical identity has remained largely unknown. New research by Rockefeller University's Joel E. Cohen and colleagues at the University of Haifa in Israel has identified two compounds emitted by mosquito predators that make the mosquitoes less inclined to lay eggs in pools of water.

17 Jul 2010

New microfluidic device for effective HIV diagnosis

UC Davis biomedical engineer Prof. Alexander Revzin has developed a "lab on a chip" device for HIV testing. Revzin's microfluidic device uses antibodies to "capture" white blood cells called T cells that are affected by HIV. In addition to physically binding these cells the test detects the types and levels of inflammatory proteins (cytokines) released by the cells.

17 Jul 2010

BioRadar develops TransFMDV for Foot and Mouth Disease

BioRadar UK Ltd. predicted one year ago the current severe Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) outbreaks after recording an increase of the Replikin Count (ref. 1) of the FMD Virus (FMDV) to its highest level in 52 years. Based on these findings, a new synthetic Replikins Trans-Strain FMD Vaccine, called TransFMDV(TM), has been developed and is now available. The announcement was made at the recent Biorbis Conference on Vaccine Production and Manufacturing in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The conference was attended by major pharmaceutical company executives to examine how vaccine production could be accelerated in view of the problem last year of responding "too little, too late" to the H1N1 influenza pandemic.

17 Jul 2010

Disease/Infection News

New microbicide gel reduces woman's risk of being infected with HIV, genital herpes

T-SPOT.TB test predicts TB infected persons better than TST: Study

Abbott presents 48-week PROGRESS study results at 28th International AIDS Conference

Infants in African countries receive minimum help to reduce risk of mother-to-child HIV transmission: Study

International AIDS conference focuses on HIV prevention, U.S. poverty-infection link

AIDS 2010 opens: Leaders weigh in on global HIV/AIDS funding; Clinton, Gates on efficiency

FDA joins Tox21 collaboration for improved chemical screening

PSI showcases evidence-based HIV prevention methods at International AIDS Conference

Benefits of drug L-methionine for neurogenic bladder disorders unclear

A look into HIV related issues

First Edition: July 19, 2010

Phase 2 CUBICIN study for prosthetic joint infections meets primary endpoint

Phase II data on Genetic Immunity's DermaVir vaccine to be presented at XVIII International AIDS Conference

ViroStatics to present VS411 Phase II dose-ranging trial data at International AIDS Conference in Vienna

FIT Biotech to present results of FIT-06 Phase II clinical trial at XVIII International AIDS 2010 Conference

Effective AIDS treatment but poor accessibility: Report from International AIDS conference 2010

Cash incentives cut down HIV transmission: World Bank Studies

New tactics for repelling, controlling disease-carrying insects

New microfluidic device for effective HIV diagnosis

BioRadar develops TransFMDV for Foot and Mouth Disease

Exploring the nanoscale: How AFM is transforming cosmetic science

Innovating Texture and Culture in Plant-Based Foods

Advancing brain microphysiological systems (bMPS)

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