ARVs: the sooner the better
Posted by Miriam Mannak on August 1, 2009
The earlier a person living with HIV it receiving antiretroviral drugs (ARVs), the better. You do not have to be a rocket scientist for this to make sense. The sicker you are, the harder the body and the meds need to work to get you back on your feet.
According to the current guidelines, a person is best put on antiretrovirals before his or her CD4 count – a measure of immunity strength – drops below 250 cells per millilitre of blood. HIV experts, however, argue that people should be put on medication even before that.
The problem is that most countries with a high HIV prevalence, of which the bulk are situated in developing countries, are not able to meet the current guidelines.
I recently wrote a story on this topic for Inter Press Service, when attending the 5th conference of the International Aids Society on prevention, treatment and pathogenesis.I attended the conference as a Journalist 2 Journalist fellow of the National Press Foundation in the US.
Please click here if you want to read it.
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This entry was posted on August 1, 2009 at 11:48 am and is filed under HIV/AIDS in Africa: News, HIV/AIDS: Treat & cure. Tagged: Aids africa, Aids south africa, aids treatment, antiretroviral, ARV, cape town, CD4, CD4 count, HIV, HIV africa, HIV AIDS, HIV Aids africa, HIV experts, HIV negative, hiv news, HIV pandemic, HIV positive, HIV south africa, HIV sub saharan africa, HIV treatment, IAS, miriam mannak, news aids, people living with HIV, south africa. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
