Washington Blade - June 21, 2002

AIDS prevention project has received a $35,000, 21/2-year grant to work on easing communication between gay people and hospitals. "We don't want special treatment," project Deputy Director Candice Moench told The Oakland Press of Pontiac. "We're there for awareness, to increase knowledge." She is coordinating a class called SCRUBS for medical personnel. As many as four in 10 physicians say they experience discomfort when providing care to a gay person, according to the AIDS group. The group said it expects to train 500 health care workers on how to best treat gay people.

Researcher leaves as HIV cat study incomplete

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) -- Michael Podell, the veterinary researcher who attracted protests over his experiment infecting cats with the feline version of HIV, is leaving Ohio State University. Podell, associate professor of veterinary clinical sciences and neurosciences, leads a federally funded study that involves giving the infected cats methamphetamines. He wanted to see if the drugs speed the virus' spread and the resulting brain damage because many people with the virus that causes AIDS also abuse illegal drugs. Podell, a 10-year employee, is leaving this summer for another job and asked that the new position not be disclosed, a university spokesperson said. The five-year cat study is in its third year. The first results were published this month, showing that the methamphetamines make the virus spread 15 times faster in cat brain cells. The National Institute of Drug Abuse gave the $1.7 million grant for the study to the OSU Research Foundation. Veterinary school and federal officials will have to decide if the grant and study will continue under different leadership, Holland said.

Name-based HIV reporting approved by Pa. panel

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) -- A state panel approved a rule June 13 requiring Pennsylvanians who test positive for HIV to be reported and recorded in a state database, despite predictions that fear would prevent many of the highest-risk people from getting tests that could save their lives. The 4-1 vote by the Independent Regulatory Review Commission, which clears the way for the regulation to take effect later this year, followed several hours of testimony by Health Department officials who pushed for the reporting requirement and AIDS activists who have fought it. "This will drive the most vulnerable people, the people at greatest risk, underground," said Alicia Beatty, director of the Circle of Care, a Philadelphia organization that helps 800 families of people with AIDS. State officials emphasized that the new HIV reporting system will be kept strictly confidential. The HIV reporting requirement applies to doctors, hospitals, laboratories, HIV counselors and other professionals who receive the blood-test results.

Survey: Most sexually active men not tested for genital herpes

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. -- A recent four-city survey shows only about one-fourth of men (26 percent) who say they get tested for sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) are getting tested for genital herpes, according to a new study. "The results of this survey are frightening, but unfortunately not surprising," said Dr. Gary Richwald, former director and chief physician of the Los Angeles County STD program and University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) professor. "The bottom line is anyone who is sexually active is at risk for contracting genital herpes, which is why people need to talk to their health care providers about getting tested." The survey, which included a sample of people in New York, Chicago, Atlanta and San Diego, also finds most men fail to understand the widespread nature of genital herpes: Approximately 500,000 new cases of genital herpes are diagnosed each year. It is estimated that nine out of 10 people who have genital herpes are not aware of their condition.

Hepatitis C treatment excluded people with HIV, others

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Drug users, children and people with AIDS should not be excluded from treatment for hepatitis C, a blood-borne virus that has infected an estimated 4 million Americans and is a leading cause of liver cancer, a federal advisory panel says. A 12-member committee of experts selected by the National Institutes of Health said last month that treatment for hepatitis C has improved in recent years and that groups that previously were excluded from therapies should now receive treatment. Because there was no clinical evidence that people in these groups responded to the hepatitis C therapies, doctors tended to not treat such patients, according to Dr. James Boyle, a liver expert from the Yale University School of Medicine and chair of the panel. "We now know that these patients can respond to the standard treatment so we are recommending that they receive it," he said.
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