Pharmas failing to develop new HIV drugs

In a recent review of the nine of the largest pharmaceutical companies, the AIDS Treatment Activists Coalition (ATAC) awarded an average grade of C- with regard to HIV drug development, with one pharma company flunking in three of the five categories.

With over a million people with HIV/AIDS in the US alone, should something more be done?

--Jef Akst, Associate Editor, The Scientist

AIDS Treatment : It is not necessary to do chemotherapy, just high-nutrient food from natural substances but not from genetically engineered substances. The suggested menu is roast beef from a fat young cow.

http://www.yalagada.com ...... Forum.

What's for Breakfast ( and Lunch and Dinner ) ?
More Protein, Better Fat.
( by Sue Saltmarsh, Sebtember / October 2009 ).

http://www.thebody.com/content/art53764.html?ic=700100

WELL, WELL, WELL : NUTRITION

The other side of the battle Food and water as vital as medication in the fight against HIV

In the wake of World AIDS Day, and with the longest night of the year and deep winter just ahead, I've had some dark thoughts about Africa, and our inner cities, and the disease that has broken the hearts and bodies of millions. But HIV discoverer and 2008 Nobel Laureate Luc Montagnier has recently made some startling comments that have fanned a flickering light of hope.

To be clear, Montagnier didn't say we should stop working on finding effective AIDS medications, nor did he say HIV plays no role. But in a conversation with award-winning filmmaker Brent Leung, he did say it plays a minor role when immune function is strong, and that we have erred enormously in our focus on drugs while ignoring the futility of the battle in light of widespread hunger and unsafe water supply in Africa.

Leung, interviewing Montagnier for his film House of Numbers, asked him if treating oxidaative stress—free radical cell damage—could be a key element of our fight against the African AIDS epidemic. Montagnier answers with this: " ... we can be exposed to HIV many times without [being] chronically infected—our immune system will get rid of the virus within a few weeks, if you have a good immune system. And this is the problem also of the African people: their nutrition is not very equilibrated, they are in oxidative stress, even if they are not infected with HIV, so their immune system doesn't work well."

Africans are in oxidative stress because they are severely malnourished, and because they are exposed to countless infections, many of them courtesy of unsafe drinking water supplies.

Leung then, apparently to confirm he has understood correctly, asks: "If you have a good immune system, then your body can naturally get rid of HIV?" Montagnier says, "Yes."

Leung goes on to ask whether we should then emphasize antioxidants and other immune-boosting nutrients over antiretrovirals. Montagnier says, "We should push for more, you know, a combination of measures: antioxidants, nutrition advice ... fighting other infections, malaria, tuberculosis, parasitosis, worms ... very simple measures which [are] not very expensive, but which could do a lot ... but you know those kind[s] of measures are not very well funded."

Leung, getting it, but seemingly wanting to confirm he hasn't misunderstood, says: "There's no money in nutrition, right? There's no profit." Montagnier confirms: "There's no profit, yes. Water is important. Water is key."

Then Leung asks yet again about the possibility of a strong immune system dealing effectively with HIV: "If you take a poor African who's been infected and you build up their immune system, is it possible for them to also naturally get rid of it?" Montagnier, nodding, says, "I would think so."
"That's an important point," Leung says. Montagnier clearly agrees: "It's important knowledge which is completely neglected. People always think of drugs and vaccine. So this is a message which may be different from what you heard before ... yes, my message, it's different from what you heard from [Anthony] Fauci."

That HIV is can be fended off by a robust immune response fits exactly with what the science in other arenas is clear on: we are very much what we eat and drink and the level of toxins we are exposed to, and we become ill when the raw materials to fight that which threatens us are deficient. As much as 90 percent of the thymus gland, which is responsible for immune function, has been demonstrated lost with severely inadequate nutrition. Starving people suffer with all manner of AIDS-defining diseases whether HIV is present or not.

The solutions to AIDS are both much simpler and much broader—and much less profitable—than we've been led to believe. And though Montagnier and two other scientists interviewed for Leung's film have, since its release, said their words were quoted out of context, uncut footage now released delivers the conversation intact; it's available online, for those who want to see the context for themselves.

( By Connie Howard, December 10, 2009 )

vouweekly.com/article.php?id=13824