Anti-retrovirals could halt Aids spread in five years

A wonderful story from the BBC:

Anti-retroviral treatments (ARVs) and universal testing could stop the spread of Aids in South Africa within five years, a top scientist says.

Dr Brian Williams says the cost of giving the drugs to almost six million HIV-positive patients in the country would be $2-3bn per year.

Only about 30% get the life-saving drugs, he said, but early detection and treatment would prevent transmission.

This, he said, should be complementary to the search for an Aids vaccine.

An effective vaccine, he said, was still a long way away.

Dr Williams, a leading figure in the field of HIV research, is based at the South African Centre for Epidemiological Modelling and Analysis (Sacema) in Stellenbosch.

Rest of the story here.

So this new devolpment would be wonderful for the people of Africa who are the most AID's stricken continent in the world.

Dr Williams said a few clinical trials were already beginning in the US, Canada and sub-Saharan Africa - and he hoped to have the answer "in one or two years".

This is still a work in progress, one to two years is a great time frame considering we've been battling this disease for almost 40 years now.

Thoughts ATS?

~Keeper

Great news, stopping the spread of this virus is very important. Vaccine is problematic due to nature of the virus (it mutates very fast) however there certainly will be some kind of effective cure in the future, we just need to get there. This program should really help things out. Amount of money wasted on all kinds of secondary/non-issue things in world health-related industry is much much much much ..... much larger then cost of this project. And it IS important.

will enough people be dead in 5 years to allow for this?

hmm.

Awesome! I wonder if it will work with herpes too...

Thanks for the link. S&F!