Date: Fri, 11 Aug 1995 10:47:07 -0700 (PDT)
From: Rex Wockner <rwockner@netcom.com>
Subject: MORE 3TC AVAILABLE 


* Copyright (c) 1995 Rex Wockner and affiliates. Do not reprint without 
  permission.

                        F O L L O W - U P 

                       MORE 3TC AVAILABLE
                         by Rex Wockner

	The Glaxo Wellcome pharmaceutical company has relaxed access
requirements for its promising anti-HIV drug 3TC, which is
awaiting Food and Drug Administration approval.

	Due to alleged shortages of the drug, the company was
providing 3TC only to people with fewer than 100 CD4 cells and
limiting new enrollees to 350 per week, which had created a
waiting list of more than two months.

	Now there are 650 slots per week and CD4 cells can be as
high as 300. The drug is free until the FDA approves it for the
market.

	To get 3TC, one's doctor should phone (800) 248-9757.

	3TC has been shown in trial studies to substantially
increase CD4 immune-system cells, to reduce HIV levels in blood
cells by 99 percent, and to reduce levels of HIV in the
bloodstream by 91 percent. These results, which have been shown
to persist for at least one year (there have been no longer
studies), occur only when 3TC is used in combination with AZT. It
is theorized that when HIV mutates around AZT in an individual,
it is then susceptible to 3TC, and that when it then mutates
around 3TC, it mutates in a specific direction that once again
makes it susceptible to AZT.

	The respected Bulletin of Experimental Treatments for AIDS
(BETA) says of the 3TC/AZT combination: "[It] produces the most
pronounced and prolonged effect of any anti-HIV regimen yet
studied in suppressing HIV replication and increasing CD4 counts.
[It is] a remarkable combination."

	Glaxo Wellcome had blamed the earlier severe shortages on
inadequate production facilities. The company said it was
remodeling a factory in England to produce vastly larger
quantities of the drug.

	Meanwhile, newer trial studies are hinting that 3TC and AZT
taken together with a "protease inhibitor" can produce even more
dramatic results. The protease inhibitors, of which there are
several in trial studies, are an entirely new class of anti-HIV
therapy. All previous therapies (AZT, DDI, DDC, D4T and 3TC)
belong to the "nucleoside analogue" class of drugs.

                          == end ==