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"HIV drugs: When four is no better than
three"
The
Star (www.thestar.com.my)
(15/08/06)
TORONTO: Hopes that taking a combination of four antiretroviral drugs might
provide a revolutionary new weapon against HIV are false, according to a
study released at a world AIDS conference here.
Over the past 15 years, researchers first discovered that taking two
anti-HIV drugs was more effective than taking one, and then learnt that
taking three – the famous “triple cocktail” – was better than two.
Combination therapy quickly suppressed levels of HIV in the blood, boosted
levels of CD4 immune cells, delayed the clinical progression to AIDS and
improved a patient's chances of survival, they found.
That success, while still not a cure for HIV, bred hopes that using four
drugs in a combination could be even more effective.
But a study presented on Sunday at the 16th International AIDS Conference
found no difference between four-drug and three-drug combinations.
Roy Gulick of Weill Medical College of New York's Cornell University, who
led the research, recruited 765 patients who were newly diagnosed with HIV
but had not previously received treatment.
Half were given a standard triple therapy (AZT, epivir and efavirenz) and
the other half followed a four-drug regimen, comprising the same treatments
plus abacavir.
Over the three years of the study, 26% of the patients on the three-drug
regimen met with “virologic failure,” meaning that they had to switch to
different drugs in order to continue suppressing HIV.
Among the four-drug regimen, the failure rate was 25%.
“We found no significant differences,” said the study. — AFP
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