Date: Wed, 11 Sep 1996 10:21:24 -0400 From: "Flynn Mclean" Subject: CDC AIDS Daily Summary 09/11/96 AIDS Daily Summary September 11, 1996 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 National AIDS Clearinghouse, or any other organization. Reproduction of this text is encouraged; however, copies may not be sold, and the CDC National AIDS Clearinghouse should be cited as the source of this information. Copyright 1996, Information, Inc., Bethesda, MD ****************************************************** "Green Cross of Japan Settles AIDS Lawsuits" "States Are in a Crunch Over New AIDS Drugs" "Drug Chief Says No to Pot Plan" "Report Warned of AIDS Risk, Trial Told" "Quebec to Set Up Own Blood System" "Britons Wary of New AIDS Drug, Expert Says" "Foscarnet, Ganciclovir Protect Against AIDS-Related Kaposi's Sarcoma" "Crystallographers Pinpoint What Goes Where" "Cel-Sci Raises $5 Million" ****************************************************** "Green Cross of Japan Settles AIDS Lawsuits" New York Times (09/11/96) P. D3 Green Cross, Japan's largest maker of blood plasma products, said Tuesday that it would pay $11 million, or 1.3 billion yen, in 109 lawsuits settled over HIV-tainted blood products. The company said it hoped to settle 52 additional lawsuits by paying 700 million yen and that it expects to pay a total of 5.8 billion yen this fiscal year for 467 claimants. "States Are in a Crunch Over New AIDS Drugs" Philadelphia Inquirer (09/11/96) P. A9; Vedantam, Shankar Many states are running out of money to pay for expensive new AIDS drugs and thus failing to meet the rising demand from patients. Protease inhibitors, taken in combination with older AIDS drugs, have proven effective in extending the lives of many people with AIDS. About 70,000 people now receive the drugs through the Ryan White CARE Act, and the number is expected to increase to 100,000 next year. To meet that demand, however, the federal government would have to add $200 million a year to its current budget of $124 million, according to the National Alliance of State and Territorial AIDS Directors (NASTAD). NASTAD notes that states need to increase their funding by about $70 million. The President has proposed a $73 million increase in the drug budget for next year. "Drug Chief Says No to Pot Plan" Washington Post (09/11/96) P. A2 Gen. Barry McCaffrey, the national drug control policy director, said he opposes the proposed legalization of marijuana for medical use in California. He called the idea "dangerous and wrong," saying that Proposition 215 on California's November ballot "poses a serious threat to the effectiveness of drug enforcement and prevention" by providing legal loopholes for drug dealers. McCaffrey refuted claims that marijuana use is helpful for patients with AIDS and cancer, saying that the same psychoactive ingredient in the drug is available in a pill form already used for treating HIV wasting syndrome and chemotherapy-induced nausea. "Report Warned of AIDS Risk, Trial Told" Toronto Globe and Mail (09/10/96) P. A7; Downey, Donn In a trial charging the Canadian Red Cross (CRC) with negligence leading to the deaths of two individuals from AIDS, a Canadian doctor testified that the medical community suspected at the time that HIV was spread via blood transfusions. The estates of the plaintiffs claim the CRC was negligent in failing to screen out two gay blood donors whose blood was contaminated. Dr. Joseph Shuster, of Montreal General Hospital and McGill University, testified that in 1982, before the blood was donated, the medical community had been advised to not accept blood from gays and that hemophiliacs were at risk for AIDS. "Quebec to Set Up Own Blood System" Toronto Globe and Mail (09/10/96) P. A1; Coutts, Jane At a meeting of Canadian health officials called to reform the nation's blood system, Quebec's health minister announced that the province will set up its own system, which may run cooperatively with the new national system being planned. Jean Rochon announced the plan Monday, saying details of Quebec's plan will be announced by the end of the year. The nation's health ministers are charged with reforming the flawed blood system, which resulted in thousands of Canadians to contract HIV and hepatitis C. "Britons Wary of New AIDS Drug, Expert Says" Reuters (09/10/96) British doctors are more cautious than American physicians about prescribing the new protease inhibitors for AIDS patients, an expert said Tuesday. Dr. Ian Weller of University College London said that talk of curing AIDS with drug combinations including protease inhibitors is premature. "You are actually committing people to many, many years of treatment with combination drugs and you don't know what the long term effects are," he noted. While researchers have reported that the drugs are able to lower the level of virus in the body to undetectable amounts, Weller said the virus could be hiding in other sites. "Foscarnet, Ganciclovir Protect Against AIDS-Related Kaposi's Sarcoma" Reuters (09/10/96) The anti-herpesvirus drugs foscarnet and ganciclovir have been shown to protect against the development of Kaposi's sarcoma in patients with HIV. British researchers studied the use of the drugs and the occurrence of Kaposi's sarcoma, after a new herpesvirus was associated with the disease. Dr. Amanda Mocroft of the Royal Free Hospital School of Medicine and colleagues found that, among 3,600 patients with HIV, 16.2 percent developed Kaposi's over a four-year period. Treatment with foscarnet and ganciclovir were associated with a decreased risk for the disease. Acyclovir was found not to have a protective effect. "Crystallographers Pinpoint What Goes Where" Science (08/30/96) Vol. 273, No. 5279, P. 1174; Service, Robert F. AZT may not be as effective against HIV as it could be because its molecular structure may not fit well with the cellular enzyme needed for its activation, say researchers from Germany's Max Planck Institute for Molecular Physiology. AZT is designed to prevent viruses like HIV from replicating by blocking the nucleotide thymidine, which the virus needs to translate the RNA in their genome into DNA inside the cells they invade. Arnon Lavie, Jochen Reinstein, and colleagues found that AZT lacks the proper structure to bind to thymidylate kinase (TmpK), the enzyme needed for the drug to block thymidine. The researchers are trying to crystallize AZT in conjunction with TmpK to determine if this is the problem. Better-binding forms of the drug could be developed if their theory proves correct. "Cel-Sci Raises $5 Million" Washington Business Journal (08/23/96-08/29/96) Vol. 15, No. 15, P. 45 Cel-Sci's recent U.S. private placement generated $5 million in revenue that will be used to further research and development on the biotechnology firm's cancer and HIV products. Cel-Sci officials expect the $10 million now possessed by the concern to be adequate to support the company's operations for about two years. Important clinical data from several ongoing cancer and HIV studies are expected in less than a year.