Isentress (raltegravir), Merck’s integrase inhibitor, is now approved for children 2 years of age and older, according to a U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announcement. In addition, 100 milligram (mg) and 25 mg chewable tablets were approved for use in children requiring antiretroviral (ARV) therapy involving Isentress.

The approval recommendation is based, in part, on the successful completion of a clinical trial involving 126 ARV therapy-experienced children and adolescents between the ages of 2 and 18. All study volunteers received Isentress in combination with other ARVs. Of the 126 patients, 96 received the recommended dose of Isentress.

In these 96 children and adolescents, the frequency, type and severity of drug-related side effects through 24 weeks of treatment were comparable to those observed in Isentress clinical trials involving adults.

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An HIV vaccine created by Canadian researchers has just been approved by the FDA for human clinical trials. University of Western Ontario professor and researcher Dr. Chil-Yong Kang stated, “FDA approval for human clinical trials is an extremely significant milestone for our vaccine, which has the potential to save the lives of millions of people around the world by preventing HIV infection.”

Although other types of Human Immunodeficiency Virus vaccines have been tested before, the UWO-created vaccine is the first to use a whole killed virus in the composition of its vaccine. In early testing, the vaccine created a strong immune response, with no adverse effects, the researchers proudly stated.

The vaccine, named SAV001, will now have to undergo the US Food and Drug Administration’s rigorous human trial protocols, starting with phase 1. In January of 2012, the vaccine will be retested for safety on 30 HIV-positive volunteers. After the retest is completed and deemed safe, the researchers will enact the next step in their vaccine’s trials. In phase 2, researchers will examine their subjects’ immune responses to the vaccine. This will involve 600 HIV-negative volunteers. They are taking a huge risk in exposing themselves to the live virus. Phase 3 will continue data collection to determine the efficacy of the vaccine. In this phase they will test it on 6000 high-risk volunteers.

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U.S. President Barack Obama spoke out Thursday, December 1, for this year’s World AIDS Day, declaring the “beginning of the end of AIDS”, thus renewing America’s commitment to defeat the pandemic that has killed over 30 million people.

In support of his statement Obama declared that the US would be upping their budget allocated for AIDS by $50 million and set a goal of providing antiviral drugs to 2 million people within 2 years. Obama gave hope to his citizens saying, “Who could imagine we would be talking about an AIDS-free generation, because that’s what we are talking about.”

According to the United Nations, over the past decade HIV infections have fell and treatments have risen New infections dropped more than a quarter between 2001 and 2009 across 33 countries, with more than 6.6 million receiving antiretroviral therapy in low and middle-income countries last year compared with just 400, 000 in 2003.

The UN secretary general was quoted stating, “Heading into the fourth decade of AIDS, we are finally in a position to end the epidemic”.

For some this seems just too good to be true; after so many years of suffering and so many lives taken too early, thinking of an actual end to the AIDS epidemic is more pf a dream than an actual reality. But the World Health Organization declared “The tide is turning – the tools to achieve an AIDS-free generation are in out hands”.

The only thing that may threaten this amazing goal and forethought is the looming recession; But officials are still increasing HIV research spending, which comes as a relief to the some 34 million people in this world that are currently living with the HIV/AIDS virus. Globally about half of eligible adults are receiving treatment for AIDS with the most dramatic improvement made in the sub-Saharan Africa, which recorded a 20-per-cent jump in people undergoing treatment between 2009 and 2010.

HIV is one of the today’s biggest and most common killers, and has always been a huge problem worldwide. UNAIDS annual report however, released last week confirmed that the number of people reportedly contracting the disease has dropped by 19% since 1999.

HIV is the virus which causes AIDS, a terminal disease which deteriorates the immune system. This leaves patients vulnerable to many other diseases and infections which the body is unable to fight. The infection is considered a pandemic due to the huge numbers of people who contract the illness.

UNAIDS believes that one of the main reasons for the decline in HIV infections is due to people practising safer sex. Although the disease cannot be cured, there are certain HIV drugs which slow the virus allowing the patient to enjoy a longer life. These RX drugs are available from Canadian online pharmacies and are offered at low cost prices for your convenience.

Some of these drugs are designed to slow the growth of the HIV virus, including Atripla, Isentress and Rayataz and they are all available from online Canada pharmacy and offering cheap drugs, providing you the service of purchasing top quality drugs from the comfort of your own home. Raltegravir is the generic name for Isentress drug, which is the first FDA approved inhibitor of the HIV virus and works by obstructing the enzymes that the virus needs in order to grow.

Although these drugs are widely available to sufferers of the frightening virus, millions of people are still not getting the drugs that they need. The recommendation is to seek the advice of your doctor, as they can often prescribe RX drugs in order to help fight the virus within the body and add years onto your life.

The virus was first discovered in 1981, and since this finding until 2006, over 25 million people were found to be infected with the virus. The danger is that it spreads extremely quickly with the majority of infections being passed by unprotected sex, although it is also transferred through blood of a HIV infected patient coming into contact with an open wound, and mothers passing it onto their unborn children.

With the AIDs medications to slow the disease available from Canada pharmacies there is hope for infected patients to live a normal, healthy and fulfilling life.

2009 polls showed that most Americans think that AIDS is no longer a major problem. They are wrong. AIDS infection rates are continuing to soar, with 31% of new infections in heterosexuals. The number of women being diagnosed with HIV is rising steadily, particularly among non-whites. Over 1 million Americans are currently living with HIV (human immunodeficiency virus), the virus that causes AIDS.

In 1991, AIDS was the leading cause of death in American men between the ages of 25 and 44. In 1996, AIDS researcher Dr. David Ho was named Time Magazine’s Man of the Year after he pioneered an AIDS drug cocktail which was able to cut the HIV viral load in AIDS patients down to undetectable levels. Following his discovery, AIDS deaths declined by over 40 percent in the US. By 2006, HIV therapy had extended the life of the average HIV/AIDS patient by 24 years, at a cost of almost $619,000.

But in 2008, we received the bad news that AIDS in America had risen over the last five years, and was much more widespread than expected. HIV positive rates were soaring among bisexual and gay men, in particular black men.  Although blacks compose only 12% of the US population, they represent 45% of modern HIV infections. In 2010, AIDS is the fourteenth leading cause of death for the general population, but the leading cause of death in black males aged 25 to 44.

Most people get the HIV virus by having sex with an HIV positive person, sharing a needle with an HIV positive person, or being born to or drinking the breast milk of an HIV infected mother. Being HIV positive is not the same as having AIDS. HIV destroys a type of white blood cell that helps your body fight disease, weakening your immune system and eventually resulting in AIDS. Without treatment, nearly everyone with HIV will get AIDS. While we now have effective HIV therapy that drastically slows the progression of the disease and allows victims to remain symptom-free for years, we still don’t have a cure.

HIV drugs slow down the multiplication of the virus. The first HIV drugs, reverse transcriptase inhibitors, are still being used today. A second class, non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors, hit the market in 1996, around the same time as the groundbreaking third class, protease inhibitors. They were followed by entry or fusion inhibitors in 2003, and integrase inhibitors in 2007. New HIV drugs are currently in development in the existing classes, and new classes are also being researched.

Each class blocks the virus in different ways, so HIV medication guidelines recommend combinations of three or four HIV drugs.  For that reason, many HIV medications combine two or more HIV drugs into one.  For example, the widely prescribed GlaxoSmithKline Trizivir combines Epivir 150 mg with Ziagen 300 mg and Retrovir 300 mg.

It’s estimated that nearly half of the Americans who are currently HIV positive don’t know it. “We must confront fear,” says Dr. Kevin Fenton, PhD, of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “Many men do not get tested and retested because they are afraid of what they might learn. Finding out you have HIV is hard, but not knowing is even worse and puts your life and others’ lives at risk.”