CROI - San Francisco - Part 3

The afternoon of the Wednesday session was devoted to Supplements and Posters. The first Supplement described an extract of bananas,yes bananas. that stopped the HIV virus in culture. As of yet no clinical trials have started for people taking ARV's and bananas, but some of those macaque monkeys that don't do so well with the virus, might be interested.

Vitamin D has become a hot topic as a supplement not only for HIV- people but for HIV+ people. Vitamin D deficiency is noted in various trials to be significantly low in 40-50% of HIV infected patients and those people did significantly worse. HIV positive people, especially in areas where there is low sunlight like the northeastern United States do worse, even with effective anitretroviral therapy.

Supplementation with Vitamin D, either by tablets or by taking milk and lots of milk is helpful, not only in slowing down the virus, but in preventing the fractures that occur in people who have low vitamin D levels.

Finally there has been a great attention at this afternoon session to the fact that antiretroviral therapy, no matter how many drugs are used, will not eradicate the virus. It is going to take something like gene therapy, or a supplement such as adult bone marrow stem cell enhancer to defeat the reservoirs of HIV, most of which are in the memory T cells. The best marker down the line to see whether there has been eradication of the virus is the Pro-viral DNA assay. To eradicate the virus the pro-viral DNA will have to be 0, will not be able to rebound on the eradicating type of therapy, and eventually will have to remain 0 after whatever treatment has been chosen that eradicates the virus.

We believe we have a chance with the supplement Blue green algae of being that eradicating agent coupled with the proper antiretroviral therapy. To see if our data and our hypotheses are fulfilled we need funding from people like you who want to see and end end this pandemic. To donate to the cause you can donate on line at www.schickfoundation.org or www.schickresearch.com . You can also send a donation to The Peter Schick Foundation, 1223 Wilshire Blvd. #1007, Santa Monica California, 90403. You can call me at 1-310-394-7989 and I will answer any question you have about the funding process or about HIV in general.