Date: Wed, 15 Nov 1995 09:38:58 +0500 From: ghfostel{CONTRACTOR/ASPEN/ghfostel}%NAC-GATEWAY.ASPEN@ace.aspensys.com Subject: CDC AIDS Daily Summary 11/15/95 AIDS Daily Summary November 15, 1995 The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) National AIDS Clearinghouse makes available the following information as a public service only. Providing this information does not constitute endorsement by the CDC, the CDC Clearinghouse, or any other organization. Reproduction of this text is encouraged; however, copies may not be sold, and the CDC Clearinghouse should be cited as the source of this information. Copyright 1995, Information, Inc., Bethesda, MD ************************************************************ "Advocates Want D.C. Declared a Disaster Area" "The Ripple Effect: Empty Halls, Lost Money, Discontent" "Addenda: Glaxo Wellcome" "Lifeline: Play's the Thing" "Cuba Has 1,180 HIV Positive Cases" "Obituaries: Bruce B. Decker; Activist Served on State AIDS Panel" "RBC-CD4 HIV/AIDS Therapy; Preliminary Results Show No Significant Adverse Effects in HIV Patients" "OncoRx Announces Third Quarter Results" "Multiple Introductions of HIV-1 Subtype E into the Western Hemisphere" "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" ************************************************************ "Advocates Want D.C. Declared a Disaster Area" Washington Post (11/15/95) P. D1; Loeb, Vernon A coalition of Washington, D.C. advocacy groups, known as the Fair Budget Coalition, plans to ask the Federal Emergency Management Agency to recommend that the city be declared a "modified emergency," based on widespread poverty, spreading infectious disease, poor healthcare, unemployment, and increasing homelessness. The organization held a public hearing on Tuesday to gather evidence to support its request. Jonathan M. Smith, executive director of the D.C. Prisoners' Legal Services Project and an organizer of the hearing said that conditions in many areas of the city are close to those in regions hit by hurricanes. Smith also noted that the District's current prison population of 10,265 represents nearly 2 percent of the total city's population. Approximately 10 percent to 25 percent of the inmates are HIV-positive, according to Howard McDonough, board president of the Washington AIDS Ministry. "The ultimate fear of any inmate with HIV," he said, "is to die in prison." McDonough said he is aware of three such prisoners who died in the past three months because corrections officials did not process their medical parole forms in a timely manner. "The Ripple Effect: Empty Halls, Lost Money, Discontent" Washington Post (11/15/95) P. A1; Montgomery, David The U.S. government closed on Tuesday, thanks to the federal budget impasse. Hundreds of thousands of government workers will be affected by the shutdown, and companies that do business with the government will face delayed payments. Jim Graham, executive director of the Whitman-Walker Clinic, the Washington, D.C. area's largest AIDS service provider, said that shutting down the government "would have a devastating impact. What does this do to the psychology of giving when people are facing days unpaid?" "Addenda: Glaxo Wellcome" New York Times (11/15/95) P. D7 Glaxo Wellcome has selected New York-based FCB Healthcare, a division of True North Communications, to manage the consolidated advertising account for its HIV drugs Retrovir, Mepron, Daraprim, and Septra. The account was previously distributed amongst FCB Healthcare and Harrison, Star, Wiener & Beitler, New York. "Lifeline: Play's the Thing" USA Today (11/15/95) P. 1D; Vigoda, Arlene Betty Buckley, star of the Broadway show "Sunset Boulevard," is participating in a Norma Desmond Day. The highest bidder will work with Buckley for one day, both learning the role and doing a walk-on in the performance. The proceeds will benefit Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS. Bids, which can be phoned in at 212-221-9413, will be accepted until the end of the year. The highest bid thus far is $6,000. "Cuba Has 1,180 HIV Positive Cases" Reuters (11/14/95) There have been 1,180 cases of HIV recorded in Cuba, the official news agency Presna Latina announced Tuesday. It reported that Manuel Hernandez, head of the national anti-AIDS campaign, said that 271 of that total had died and 413 had developed AIDS. Hernandez added that there have been 76 new HIV infections in Cuba thus far in 1995. The country has kept its AIDS rate relatively low via mass testing for HIV and a system of sanatoriums which cares for yet isolates patients. For the past two years, however, infected persons who have demonstrated responsible behavior have been allowed to live on their own. "Obituaries: Bruce B. Decker; Activist Served on State AIDS Panel" Los Angeles Times (11/14/95) P. A18; Oliver, Myrna AIDS activist and philanthropist Bruce B. Decker died of AIDS-related complications on Saturday at the age of 45. Mr. Decker served four years as former Calif. Gov. George Deukmejian's chairman of the state AIDS Advisory Committee. In addition, he was the founder and finance chairman of a campaign against Proposition 64, a measure defeated in 1986 which would have included quarantining people with HIV and AIDS. Two years later, Mr. Decker resigned from his position, demonstrating his opposition to Deukmejian's support of Proposition 102, which would have forced disclosure of HIV-infected individuals and listing of their sexual partners. Meanwhile, Mr. Decker also helped promote the American Foundation for AIDS Research, and was the founder and president of the Health Policy and Research Foundation, which financed AIDS-related projects. "RBC-CD4 HIV/AIDS Therapy; Preliminary Results Show No Significant Adverse Effects in HIV Patients" Business Wire (11/14/95) Sheffield Medical Technologies Inc. has begun the dose-escalation part of a Phase I/IIA clinical trial for its HIV/AIDS therapeutic, RBC-CD4. The company also reports that the preliminary results of the first phase of the trial indicate that the drug was well tolerated and had no significant side effects in HIV-infected subjects at levels studied so far. RBC-CD4 was developed to lower the amount of HIV in the bloodstream and thus inhibit AIDS progression. The study is being undertaken as part of a company-sponsored IND at the Johns Hopkins University Schools of Public Health and Medicine. "OncoRx Announces Third Quarter Results" Business Wire (11/14/95) OncoRx Inc. reported a third-quarter loss of $1,284,420, or 21 cents a share, on Tuesday. In addition, the company--responding to the FDA Antiviral Drugs Advisory Committee's recent recommendation for the rapid approval of 3TC as part a combination therapy for HIV--released a statement asserting that it holds the exclusive rights to a U.S. patent application for the drug for use with hepatitis B. The biopharmaceutical company has also licensed the exclusive rights to patent applications on a number of other anti-hepatitis B and -HIV products. "Multiple Introductions of HIV-1 Subtype E into the Western Hemisphere" Lancet (11/04/95) Vol. 346, No. 8984, P. 1197; Artenstein, Andrew W.; Coppola, Julieta; Brown, Arthur E. The HIV epidemic in Southeast Asia is primarily due to HIV-1 subtype E. Artenstein et al. analyzed the HIV-1 subtypes of 11 Uruguayan military personnel. Five of the six infections that were acquired during a United Nations deployment in Cambodia were identified as subtype E. Previous reports have limited the occurrence of subtype E to Southeast Asia and Central Africa. Meanwhile, all five of the domestic-acquired infections were labeled subtype B--the prevalent subtype in Uruguay as well as North America and Europe. According to the authors, these findings clearly identify several instances of HIV-1 subtype E being introduced into the western hemisphere and indicate that the genetic diversity of the HIV-1 pandemic must be taken into account for epidemic control. "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" Advocate (11/14/95) No. 694, P. 32; Gallagher, John Gay participants in the Million Man March on Washington on October 16 said they were welcomed by other marchers, but that they were disappointed by the distant reception they got from march organizers who backed out of a promise to include an openly gay speaker. However, Elias Farajaje-Jones, a divinity professor at Howard University, questioned whether the march would have a long-term effect on matters important to black gay men, including HIV and the killing of black transpersons. Still, H. Alexander Robinson, president of the board of the National Task Force on AIDS Prevention, said he was "disturbed" by only one incident from the stage at the Million Man March. The incident to which Robinson refers was when Nation of Islam health minister Abdul Alim Muhammed attributed one man's alleged clearing of HIV to Kemron, a treatment embraced by the Nation of Islam yet considered useless by medical officials. "We had been pushing for a person with AIDS to talk, and for that to be the only message was disappointing," he commented. Members of the Black Gay and Lesbian Leadership Forum had actually called for both a black man with AIDS and an openly gay black man to be included among the speakers. Eventually, Benjamin Chavis, a key march organizer, promised an unnamed gay speaker. This speaker, however, never showed, further increasing black gays' sense of frustration.