Russia policies slammed at HIV conference

MOSCOW (AFP) - Russia came under fire from international AIDS campaigners on Wednesday for refusing to provide drug users with drug substitution therapy to stem a spreading HIV epidemic.

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Russia's chief medical official Gennady Onishchenko told a major AIDS conference that Moscow opposed providing methadone -- a synthetic drug that is not injected -- to heroin users.


He said that Russia preferred to use other methods in fighting the spread of HIV, including calling on the authority of the increasingly powerful Russian Orthodox Church.


"Russia speaks out categorically against this component in prevention programmes," Onishchenko told the Eastern Europe and Central Asia AIDS Conference, adding that methadone is outlawed in Russia.


But in a country where 500,000 people are infected with the HIV virus, international speakers at the conference expressed disappointment that Russia could be ignoring a potentially crucial method to stem the spread of HIV.

Smokers could go virtual to kick the habit: study

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Battling one's cigarette demons in a virtual world may prove to be an effective way to help people quit smoking, a research team has found in a preliminary study.

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Scientists from Canada's GRAP Occupational Psychology Clinic and the University of Quebec modified a three-dimensional video game to create a computer-generated virtual reality environment as part of an anti-smoking program.


Out of 91 regular smokers enlisted in the 12-week program, 46 of them crushed computer-simulated cigarettes as part of psychosocial treatment, while the other 45 grasped a computer-simulated ball.


The group who crushed cigarettes had a "statistically significant reduction in nicotine addiction" compared with the ball-graspers, according to the study released Tuesday in the journal Cyber-Psychology and Behavior.


By the 12th week, abstinence among the cigarette crushers was 15 percent, compared with just two percent for the other group.


The crushers also stayed in the program longer, and at a six-month follow-up, 39 percent of them reported not smoking during the previous week, compared with 20 percent of the ball graspers.


"It is important to note that this study increased treatment retention," said Brenda Wiederhold, the journal's editor in chief, adding that such treatment should now be compared to other popular treatments such as the nicotine patch.


The study said some 45 percent of smokers in the United States try to quit each year, with limited success.

Health experts say Russia's abstinence approach no match for fast-growing AIDS epidemic

MOSCOW - AIDS experts urged Russian officials to scrap their abstinence-based strategy for curbing the spread of HIV, saying the country's fast-growing epidemic could be entering a dangerous new phase.


AIDS specialists meeting here urged Russia on Wednesday to adopt successful strategies like needle-exchange programs and heroin substitutes such as methadone for drug addicts.


The number of HIV infections in Russia has doubled in the past eight years and there is evidence that in this region the virus is increasingly being spread by heterosexual sex.


The rapid growth of the epidemic in Russia is in contrast to sub-Saharan Africa and South and Southeast Asia, where prevalence of the virus fell during the same eight-year period, according to UNAIDS, the United Nations AIDS agency.


Russia's chief public health officer, Gennady Onishchenko, told a regional AIDS conference Wednesday that Russia is "emphatically against" the use of drug replacement therapy. Meanwhile, he criticized programs that exchange clean needles for used ones, saying such programs may promote illicit drug sales and HIV transmission.


Both are part of a so-called harm reduction strategy, in contrast to the just-say-no programs that urge abstinence from drugs and risky sex. Russian health officials say they are committed overall to a "healthy lifestyles" rather than a harm reduction approach to improving public health.


That isn't good enough, a number of foreign experts say.


"International studies show that an abstinence-based message on drug use or sex simply doesn't work," said Robin Gorna, executive director of the International AIDS Society. In Russia, she said, "it does appear that ideology is getting in the way of public health care policy."


Russia has increased spending on AIDS programs by 33 times since 2006, making it a central part of an ambitious new national health care strategy. It has expanded drug treatment dramatically for AIDS sufferers and is among the leaders worldwide in reducing the incidence of transmission of the disease between mothers and their babies.

Canadian researchers pioneer gene therapy to repair lungs for transplant

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Foreign pharmaceutical firms including Pfizer have agreed to accept Ecuador's decision to bypass patents on 2,000 drugs in order to produce them locally or buy cheaper versions elsewhere.

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"We accept the democratic decision... to legally implement this extraordinary measure," the 14 companies including European and American giants such as Bayer and GSK said through the local pharmaceutical industry association on Wednesday.


"No legal right is superior to the requirements of public health, especially in such serious circumstances," the association statement added.


Last Friday the South American nation's socialist government led by President Rafael Correa decided to break 2,214 patents, issue "compulsory licenses" to local laboratories and pay foreign labs compensation of up to 10 percent of net sales of the drugs.


According to a report from research firm Intercontinental Marketing Services (IMS), foreign firms control about 82 percent of the Ecuadoran pharmaceutical market valued at some 720 million dollars annually.


Ecuadoran authorities, who have not indicated exactly how much compensation would be disbursed, said the de facto monopoly enjoyed by some brands led to inflated drug prices.


As an example, the president of Ecuador's Intellectual Property Institute (IEPI), Andres Ycaza, cited the case of a local laboratory requesting a license in 2002 to produce a GSK-patented antiretroviral, which prompted the British laboratory to slash the price of its drug from 350 dollars to 60 dollars.


"High costs, insufficient production and a lack of research have contributed to the fact that millions of people do not enjoy equitable access to medicines in developing countries such as Ecuador," Ycaza said.


Quito has ensured that the move is legal, citing mechanisms under the World Trade Organization which enable countries in health emergencies to compel multinationals to allow local production in the interest of public health.


Brazil and Thailand are among the countries that have broken patents on AIDS drugs in order to either produce versions of the drugs themselves or buy cheaper generic alternatives from countries such as India.

Face pain

broken or chipped. Openings in the tooth enamel allow bacteria to infect the center of the tooth (the pulp). Infection may spread out from the root of the tooth and to the bones supporting the tooth.

Infection results in a collection of pus (dead tissue, live and dead bacteria, white blood cells) and swelling of the tissues within the tooth. This causes a painful toothache. If the root of the tooth dies, the toothache may stop, unless an abscess develops. This is especially true if the infection remains active and continues to spread and destroy tissue.

Symptoms
The main symptom is a severe toothache. The pain is continuous and may be described as gnawing, sharp, shooting, or throbbing.

Kegel exercises

Women with urinary stress incontinence
Some men who have urinary incontinence after prostate surgery
People who have fecal incontinence
Kegel exercises strengthen the muscles of the pelvic floor to improve urethral and rectal sphincter function. The success of Kegel exercises depends on proper technique and sticking to a regular exercise program.

Some people have trouble finding and isolating the muscles of the pelvic floor. It's important to learn how to tighten (contract) the correct muscles. Most people contract the abdominal or thigh muscles, and don't work the pelvic floor muscles. These incorrect contractions can worsen pelvic floor tone and incontinence.

Several techniques can help you find the right muscles. One approach is to sit on the toilet and start to urinate. Try to stop the flow of urine midstream by tightening your pelvic floor muscles. Repeat this action several times until you learn the feel of contracting the right group of muscles. Do not contract your abdominal, thigh, or buttocks muscles while doing the exercise.

Another approach to help you find the correct muscle group is to insert a finger into the vagina (in women), or rectum (in men). Try to tighten the muscles around your finger as if holding back urine. The abdominal and thigh muscles should stay relaxed.

A woman can also strengthen these muscles by using a vaginal cone, which is a weighted device that is inserted into the vagina. Then try to contract the pelvic floor muscles to hold the device in place.

If you are unsure whether you are doing the Kegel correctly, you can use biofeedback and electrical stimulation to help find the correct muscle group to work.

Biofeedback is a method of positive reinforcement. Electrodes are placed on the abdomen and along the anal area. Some therapists place a sensor in the vagina in women or anus in men to monitor the contraction of pelvic floor muscles.

A monitor will display a graph showing which muscles are contracting and which are at rest. The therapist can help find the right muscles for performing Kegel exercises.

Electrical stimulation involves using low-voltage electric current to stimulate the correct group of muscles. The current may be delivered using an anal or vaginal probe. The electrical stimulation therapy can be done in the clinic or at home.

AIDS Medicines

In the early 1980s, when the AIDS epidemic began, AIDS patients rarely lived longer than a few years. But today, people infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, have longer and healthier lives. The main reason is that there are many effective medicines to fight the infection.

Most medicines fall into one of the following three categories

Reverse transcriptase (RT) inhibitors. These medicines interfere with a critical step during the HIV life cycle and keep the virus from reproducing.
Protease inhibitors. These medicines interfere with a protein that HIV uses to produce infectious viral particles.
Fusion inhibitors. These medicines block the virus from entering the body's cells.
While these medicines help people with HIV, they are not perfect. They do not cure HIV infection or AIDS. People with HIV infection still have the virus in their bodies, so even when they are taking medicines they can transmit HIV to others through unprotected sex and needle sharing.

Pacemakers and Implantable Defibrillators

An arrhythmia is any disorder of your heart rate or rhythm. It means that your heart beats too quickly, too slowly or with an irregular pattern. Most arrhythmias result from problems in the electrical system of the heart. If your arrhythmia is serious, you may need one of two devices implanted under your skin: a cardiac pacemaker or an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD).

A pacemaker monitors the electrical impulses in the heart. When needed, it delivers electrical pulses to make the heart beat in a more normal rhythm. A pacemaker may be helpful when the heart beats too slowly or has other abnormal rhythms. An ICD is a device that monitors heart rhythms. If it senses dangerous rhythms, it delivers shocks. Many ICDs record the heart's electrical patterns when there is an abnormal heartbeat. This can help the doctor plan future treatment.

Sexually Transmitted Diseases

Also called: Sexually transmitted infections, STDs, Venereal disease
Sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) are infections that you can get from having sex with someone who has the infection. The causes of STDs are bacteria, parasites and viruses. There are more than 20 types of STDs, including

Chlamydia
Gonorrhea
Herpes Simplex
HIV/AIDS
HPV
Syphilis
Trichomoniasis
Most STDs affect both men and women, but in many cases the health problems they cause can be more severe for women. If a pregnant woman has an STD, it can cause serious health problems for the baby.

If you have an STD caused by bacteria or parasites, your health care provider can treat it with antibiotics or other medicines. If you have an STD caused by a virus, there is no cure. Sometimes medicines can keep the disease under control. Correct usage of latex condoms greatly reduces, but does not completely eliminate, the risk of catching or spreading STDs.

Leukodystrophies

The leukodystrophies are rare diseases that affect the cells of the brain. Specifically, the diseases affect the myelin sheath, the material that surrounds and protects nerve cells. Damage to this sheath slows down or blocks messages between the brain and the rest of the body. This leads to problems with

Movement
Speaking
Vision
Hearing
Mental and physical development
Most of the leukodystrophies are genetic. They usually appear during infancy or childhood. They can be hard to detect early because children seem healthy at first. However, symptoms gradually get worse over time.

There are no cures for any of the leukodystrophies. Medicines, speech therapy and physical therapy might help with symptoms. Researchers are testing bone marrow transplantation as a treatment for some of the leukodystrophies.

Macular Degeneration

Also called: Age-related macular degeneration, AMD
Macular degeneration, or age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is a leading cause of vision loss in Americans 60 and older. It is a disease that destroys your sharp, central vision. You need central vision to see objects clearly and to do tasks such as reading and driving.

AMD affects the macula, the part of the eye that allows you to see fine detail. It does not hurt, but it causes cells in the macula to die. In some cases, AMD advances so slowly that people notice little change in their vision. In others, the disease progresses faster and may lead to a loss of vision in both eyes. Regular comprehensive eye exams can detect macular degeneration before the disease causes vision loss. Treatment can slow vision loss. It does not restore vision.

Soothing Imagery May Help Rid Some Kids of Stomach Pain

Oct. 13 (HealthDay News) -- Children who experience frequent stomach aches can use their imagination to reduce their pain, new study findings suggest.

The study included 34 participants, aged 6 to 15 years, with functional abdominal pain, which is a persistent pain with no identifiable underlying disease. All the children received standard medical care, but 19 also received eight weeks of guided imagery therapy, which is similar to self-hypnosis.

The audio recordings for the guided imagery therapy consisted of four bi-weekly, 20-minute sessions and 10-minute daily sessions. The therapy offered the children suggestions and imagery for reducing abdominal discomfort. For example, in one session they were told to imagine a special shiny object melting in their hand. They then placed the hand on their abdomen, spreading warmth and light from the hand into the belly in order to create a protective barrier that prevents anything from irritating the belly.

The children in the guided imagery group were almost three times more likely to experience improvement in their abdominal pain than those who received standard treatment alone, the researchers found. The benefits of the guided imagery lasted for six months after the end of the sessions.

"What is especially exciting about our study is that children can clearly reduce their abdominal pain a lot on their own with guidance from audio recordings, and they get much better results that way than from medical care," study lead author Miranda van Tilburg, an assistant professor in the gastroenterology and hepatology division of the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, and a member of the UNC Center for Functional GI and Motility Disorders, said in a university news release.

"Such self-administered treatment is, of course, very inexpensive and can be used in addition to other treatments, which potentially opens the door for easily enhancing treatment outcomes for a lot of children suffering from frequent stomach aches," she added