November 2001

Contents

Conference reports

• 8th European Conference on Clinical Aspects and Treatment of HIV-infection, Athens, 28-31 October 2001

• HIV drug resistance can develop under HAART at low levels of viraemia

• Combinations of lopinavir/r and amprenavir in heavily treatment experienced patients

• Further reports of benefits of polylactic acid for facial lipoatrophy

• GigaHAART study shows benefit of treatment interruption prior to treatment with >7 drugs in highly treatment experienced patients

• Tenofovir DF 907 study

• The Max Cmin 1 trial: indinavir/ritonavir vs. saquinavir/ritonavir

• No significant drug interactions found between tenofovir DF and indinavir, lopinavir/r, lamivudine, or efavirenz

• Ritonavir corrects drug interaction between efavirenz and saquinavir

• Lopinavir/r effective in naive patients after three years of treatment

Antiretrovirals

• Prevalence of adverse events associated with potent antiretroviral treatment: Swiss HIV cohort study

• European CPMP gives positive opinion for European licensing of tenofovir DF

• EC approves abacavir for use by HIV-infected children

• Report on salvage therapy from the 39th annual meeting of the IDSA

Side effects

• Preventable factors linked to indinavir-associated renal complications

• Nerve growth factor improves HIV-associated sensory neuropathy

• Lipodystrophy in HAART-treated patients may have multifactorial aetiology

Coinfections and complications

• HIV infection may trigger neurologic disorder

Hepatitis coinfection

• Daily injection more effective than thrice-weekly interferon alpha-2b for HCV/HIV

Basic science and immunology

• HIV infects naive T cells leading to depletion

• Rapidly progressive HIV case highlights importance of specific immune response

• CCR5 density on T cells directly correlates with HIV disease progression

• Human herpes virus 6 prevents CCR5 tropic HIV from spreading in human tissue cultures

Drug resistance

• Patients refractory to HIV treatment require close monitoring

Other news

• South Africa hits out at pharmaceutical companies on AIDS drugs

On the web

• The drug development pipeline

• When to start treatment tecommendations

PDFs

• Volume 2 Number 9 November 2001 PDF