AIDS Daily Summary February 27, 1995 The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) National AIDS Clearinghouse makes available the following information as a public service only. Providing this information does not constitute endorsement by the CDC, the CDC Clearinghouse, or any other organization. Reproduction of this text is encouraged; however, copies may not be sold, and the CDC Clearinghouse should be cited as the source of this information. Copyright 1995, Information, Inc., Bethesda, MD ************************************************************ "Coach Defends Silence About Louganis" "World Wire: Postscripts" "Marijuana: Defying Laws to Help the Ill" "2-Year Nightmare Ends for Woman Wrongly Told She Had AIDS Virus" "At Conference, Researchers Weigh Toll of AIDS on Women" "Doctors Test AIDS Relief Drug in Cameroon" "California Judge Strikes Down Needle Exchange Program" "Danish Haemophiliacs Lose Compensation Claim" "Research Reports: Liposome Technology" "Latex a Good HIV Barrier, but Research Still Indefinite" "CDC's Draft Guidelines for HIV Counseling and Voluntary Testing for Pregnant Women Now Available from the CDC National AIDS Clearinghouse" ************************************************************ "Coach Defends Silence About Louganis" Washington Post (02/27/95) P. C2 At a news conference on Saturday, seven-time U.S. Olympic coach Ron O'Brien apologized for not telling U.S. team physician Jim Puffer that diver Greg Louganis was infected with HIV at the 1988 Olympics in Seoul. O'Brien kept the promise he made to Louganis in March 1988 that he would not tell anyone of the diver's illness, and said that he would do the same thing again if faced with a similar situation. "I consider the relationship of confidentiality between coach and athlete the same as a lawyer and client or doctor and patient," O'Brien said. He said the one thing he would change, however, is to tell the doctor. "World Wire: Postscripts" Wall Street Journal (02/27/95) P. A8 Legislators in Russia have passed and sent to the President amended AIDS legislation that, effective Aug. 1, would drop a requirement that people entering the country for less than three months prove they are HIV-free. Related Story: Boston Globe (02/25) P. 13 "Marijuana: Defying Laws to Help the Ill" Los Angeles Times (02/26/95) P. A1; Paddock, Richard C. The Cannabis Buyers' Club is part of a growing movement aimed at earning sick people the right to use marijuana. Nationwide, thousands of people with AIDS, cancer, glaucoma, epilepsy, and other diseases defy the law daily to treat their ailments or ease their pain. While advocates of the drug cite anecdotal evidence that the plant can reduce nausea from chemotherapy, reverse the wasting syndrome associated with AIDS, and ease muscle spasms in paralyzed people, others say there is insufficient evidence to prove the marijuana is beneficial. Some even suggest that smoking it could be harmful, particularly for AIDS patients susceptible to lung ailments. For almost three years, AIDS researcher Donald Abrams of the University of California at San Francisco has sought federal approval to conduct a clinical trial to determine whether smoking marijuana can help patients overcome the AIDS-related wasting syndrome. The Food and Drug Administration, however, has refused to authorize the research. "People in Washington are putting up barriers," Abrams said. "In my opinion, it's becoming very ridiculous. This trial will go on if the science survives the politics." "2-Year Nightmare Ends for Woman Wrongly Told She Had AIDS Virus" Los Angeles Times (02/26/95) P. A4; Sewell, Dan For two years, HIV dominated Vernelle Lowder's life. In the end, however, she found she was never infected at all. In 1980, Lowder received a blood transfusion during surgery at a hospital in Waycross, Ga. Ten years later, after her blood was drawn during a checkup for a thyroid problem, she was informed she was HIV-positive. In 1992, her doctor put her on ddI, an AIDS treatment drug that brought on side effects including vomiting and fatigue. Lowder arranged to have legal custody of her children transferred to her mother, planning to commit suicide. When she joined a local hospice group for AIDS patients, however, the counselors--noting that her T-cell counts had remained consistently high--suggested that she be retested. In Nov. 1992, Lowder learned that she was HIV-negative. Last year, a jury awarded her $600,000 for pain and suffering, but cleared the clinic and said the majority must by paid by the Florida Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services (HRS)--the agency that performed the test. Now, Lowder's attorney is seeking a legislator to sponsor the act that would raise HRS's damage payment from the $100,000 capped by statute for state agencies to the $350,000 ordered by the jury. "At Conference, Researchers Weigh Toll of AIDS on Women" Philadelphia Inquirer (02/25/95) P. A3; Jones, Rachel L. AIDS will overtake cancer as a major cause of death for American women aged 18 to 44 by the year 2000, and increasing poverty, abuse, and injection drug use among women could make it the worst public health crisis of modern times, said researchers at the first annual HIV Infection in Women Conference last week. The researchers called for a shift in the focus of medical research from targeting males to focusing on women. "There's no doubt that the epidemic will grow for women into the millennium unless there's a more aggressive prevention approach aimed directly at women," said Dr. Sten Vermund, chairman of the epidemiology department at the University of Alabama-Birmingham School of Public Health. While women represented just 7 percent of the AIDS cases among adults and adolescents in 1985, the proportion grew to 18 percent in 1994, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. Three-quarters of the AIDS cases reported among women in 1994 were among black and Latino women. "Doctors Test AIDS Relief Drug in Cameroon" Reuters (02/25/95); Tsas, Vincent In Cameroon, doctors are testing a drug to fight infections that can be fatal to AIDS patients, but is less expensive than AZT. Dr. Antoine Siboulet said a group of researchers from Toulouse, France, had discovered two years ago that injecting the drug, which is known as FM-84 and is chemically related to bleach, produced results similar to those of AZT. "Out of 30 patients with AIDS and generally at an advanced stage, we have noticed a reduction of clinical symptoms in more than 70 percent of the patients," he said. Siboulet said that FM-84 would be about five times cheaper to produce than AZT. Next month, tests will begin on 100 AIDS patients in five hospitals in Yaounde, Cameroon. "California Judge Strikes Down Needle Exchange Program" Reuters (02/24/95) On Friday, a judge struck down a proposed hypodermic needle exchange program that was intended to counter the spread of AIDS in Sacramento, Calif. The judge said the needle exchange program proposed by Sacramento County conflicted with California's drug paraphernalia law, which makes it illegal to provide hypodermics intended for drug use. "The county has no legal justification to implement a program that subsidizes and promotes behavior that has been determined by state lawmakers to be unlawful and harmful to the public interest," said Anthony Caso, an attorney opposing the program. Caso, an attorney with the Pacific Legal Foundation, said the ruling could also affect needle exchange programs in other California communities. "Danish Haemophiliacs Lose Compensation Claim" Lancet (02/18/95) Vol. 345, No. 8947, P. 446; Skovmand, Kaare A Danish High Court has turned down a claim by the Danish Hemophiliacs Association, which was acting on behalf of eight Danish hemophiliacs who claim to have acquired HIV through therapy with factor VIII in the mid-1980s. The court, however, awarded one of the eight hemophiliacs Dkr 18,718 (1,817 pounds) against the National Board of Health and the Ministry of the Interior. The court said that they should not have allowed the use of non-HIV screened factor VIII after Jan. 1, 1986. The hemophiliac who was awarded compensation was chosen for the token award because he was the latest of the eight to have become infected. The other seven hemophiliacs were not compensated because the time of their infection could not be proved. It also could not be proved that any of the defendants, including factor VIII producer Novo Nordisk, could have acted in any other way than they did. The plaintiffs had wanted the court to determine who should bear responsibility for the HIV infection. "Research Reports: Liposome Technology" Barron's (02/06/95) Vol. 75, No. 6, P. 40 Liposome Technology has completed new drug applications (NDA) for Amphocil in Europe and DOX-SL in the United States and Europe. The company plans to file a fourth NDA for Amphocil in the United States in mid-1995. Amphocil is a kindy-sparing formulation of the most potent broad-spectrum antifungal drug used to treat severely ill AIDS and cancer patients. Accelerated approval from the Food and Drug Administration is likely because both Amphocil and DOX-SL provide unmet medical needs in cancer and AIDS. "Latex a Good HIV Barrier, but Research Still Indefinite" AIDS Alert (02/95) Vol. 10, No. 2, P. 21 After nearly a decade of research, it is still not definitely known whether condoms leak HIV. While the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have repeatedly assured the public that intact latex condoms provide a continuous barrier to HIV, several studies contradict that conclusion. The Mariposa Foundation conducted the most significant research--a study of 31 brands of latex condoms that were tested at conditions that exceeded real-life situations. The study confirmed findings of a study by the National Institutes of Health and the University of California at Los Angeles suggesting that leakage of HIV occurs in some brands of latex condoms. One criticism of the study was that it used virus-like particles, and not HIV. The four lowest-ranking brands showed at least a 6 percent failure rate--Contracept Plus had a 100 percent failure rate, and was recalled several years ago. In 1992, the FDA awarded a two-year $545,000 grant to Princeton Scientific Instruments Inc. to develop optical methods of detecting holes in condoms on a mass scale--which suggests to Dr. Jerry Nelson of Nelson Labs, which helped with the Mariposa study, that the agency is not convinced that current screening standards are adequate. "CDC's Draft Guidelines for HIV Counseling and Voluntary Testing for Pregnant Women Now Available from the CDC National AIDS Clearinghouse" CDC National AIDS Clearinghouse (2/27/95) The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has just released draft guidelines for primary care providers on HIV counseling, and voluntary testing for pregnant women. The draft guidelines establish recommendations for testing all pregnant women -- regardless of their known risk factors. This is because there is clear clinical evidence that a women infected with HIV can reduce the risk of transmission of the virus to her unborn child by taking zidovudine (AZT) during pregnancy. Since many women with HIV do not know they are infected, the draft guidelines specifically recommend HIV counseling and voluntary testing early in their pregnancy to help women learn if they are infected. With accurate test results, women who are infected can get the medical care they need for themselves as well as for their unborn children. Copies of the U.S. Public Health Service Recommendations for HIV Counseling and Testing for Pregnant Women and instructions on providing comments (Inventory number D435) are available from the CDC National AIDS Clearinghouse. To obtain a copy by mail or by fax, call the Clearinghouse at 800-458-5231. For additional information about the recommendations, clinical trials on AZT, and other related issues, please call the HIV/AIDS Treatment Information Service at 800-HIV-0440.