World Health Organisation releases disease projections

nice, but...

] Seasonal flu viruses are developing the ability to evade influenza drugs globally, but how and why this is happening is not clear, experts told a conference on Monday. Europe is the worst-affected by strains of influenza that resist the effects of antiviral drugs, but the resistance is growing globally, they told a meeting of the Infectious Diseases Society of America. “A significant proportion of resistant viruses were observed in Europe this winter," Dr. Bruno Lina of Claude Bernard University in Lyons, France, told the meeting. The resistance also varies by strain, with a quarter of H1N1 flu viruses resistant in Europe and about 11 percent of H1N1 in the United States, but far fewer cases of H3N2 and influenza B viruses. Their findings show that flu viruses — already known to mutate speedily — may be even more unpredictable than anyone thought. Experts fear drugs may become quickly useless to fight an unusually severe flu season or the emergence of a new strain of flu that may cause a pandemic. They have been stressing the need to develop new flu drugs and also quicker and better ways to make vaccines. The World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have been collecting samples of the annual flu viruses to check them against the four available flu drugs: amantadine and rimantadine, and the newer drugs Tamiflu and Relenza. The viruses changed rapidly over the past 2007-2008 flu season, Lina said. “We started with something like 10 percent in Europe," Lina said. By April of this year, 25 percent of the viruses tested were resistant to Tamiflu. [url=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24712045/:
Dodging drugs[/url]

] Despite a stepped up global battle against AIDS, the numbers of people newly infected with HIV are far and away outpacing the numbers beginning antiretroviral drug treatments, U.N. officials said Monday. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, opening several days of U.N. debate on AIDS prevention, told world leaders that 2.5 million people became infected with HIV last year compared with 1 million who started using important antiretroviral drugs. “Unless greater and swifter advances are made in reaching those who need essential services, the epidemic’s burden on households, communities and societies will continue to mount," Ban said. Some 2.1 million people died of AIDS last year and at least 33 million people world wide have the virus, according to U.N. figures. “The U.N.'s conclusion is that the AIDS epidemic is overwhelming the progress made in treating it," said CBS News foreign affairs analyst Pamela Falk. “As the number of AIDS-infected individuals rises, UNAIDS, the World Health Organization and UNICEF are fighting an uphill battle," added Falk, who is based at the U.N. In addition, people with weakened immune systems from HIV are up to 50 times more likely to develop tuberculosis, U.N. officials say. “We cannot separate the fight against HIV/AIDS from the fight against TB," said General Assembly President Srgjan Kerim, who will preside over a two-day meeting on AIDS starting Tuesday. Falk noted that the conference comes on the heels of a report that one in four teen-age girls in the U.S. has a sexually transmitted disease, “adding to concerns about apathy with regard to HIV/AIDS prevention." More [url:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/06/10/world/main4167528.shtml[/url]

] In its annual World Disasters Report, the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) said today that there was “no doubt” that HIV/AIDS matches the United Nations definition of a disaster. The UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs classes a disaster as a “serious disruption of the functioning of a society, causing widespread human, material or environmental losses which exceed the ability of a society to cope using only its own resources”. The IFRC said such a situation exists in sub-Saharan Africa, which is home to about two-thirds of the world’s HIV-positive cases. At least one person in 10 is living with HIV in nations such as South Africa, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Swaziland and Zambia, the report said. The consequences of the epidemic are felt by all of society and not just people who were sick, because of the economic strain and social tensions. “Reflecting on the lives of most people living in sub-Saharan Africa raises more alarm than hope," the IFRC said. “The virus is directly responsible for restraining and reducing human and resource capacities across societies because HIV infections and AIDS deaths are common among workers of all qualifications and expertise, and in all industries. More [url:
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,23925746-23109,00.html[/url]