ARV Drugs: moving towards cure for AIDS

There are many forms of media being published today that discuss organizations like Catholic Relief Services and The Global Fund, who are providing treatment around the world to HIV/ AIDS patients. But from most of these articles one question often arises, what treatments are these organizations providing to their patients?

Today, the most common solution for treating HIV/ AIDS is the use of Antiretroviral Drugs. When HIV enters the human body, it replicates and spreads into other cells. Just like how one can acquire bronchitis from an untreated cold or flu, an HIV patient, if untreated will be infected by AIDS.

But if an HIV patient is treated with ARV medications, the HIV will not spread through the body, and the patient will not suffer from the AIDS symptoms. If a patient has succumbed to AIDS and then the syndrome is killed by the ARV drugs, AIDS will not come back into the system unless the patient stops taking his or her medication and allows the spread of HIV.

ARV drugs can be taken as a co-blister, which is when two or more pills are packaged together, or as a fixed dose combination, which is when two or more drugs are combined into one pill, capsule or tablet.

The reason for co-blisters and FDC’s in ARV drugs is that HIV can become resistant or immune to these drugs. But if a patient is taking many drugs especially ones that attack different areas of the syndrome including replication, the syndrome will be less prone to resistance.

In other words, co-blisters and FDC’s can confuse the virus long enough to

Cost of New AIDS Drugs

1. Pick one protease inhibitor from 3 on market: Indinivir - $6,000 a year Ritonavir - $8,000 a year Saquinavir - $7,800 a year

2. Add 2 other anti-HIV drugs: AZT - $3,300 a year 3TC - $2,600 a year

3. Total annual cost: Between $11,900 and $13,900 treat AIDS and fortunately bring it down to HIV.

However, there are still many problems with ARV treatments. The drugs obviously have many side effects including abdominal pain and the possibility of seizures and kidney stones. Also, the drugs must continuously be taken with perfect adherence to how it is prescribed, which for some can be hard considering the expensive cost of even a few doses of these drugs.

From this, we can understand that in curing AIDS, we can cure poverty, and in curing poverty we can cure HIV, then in curing HIV, we can save world.

STAFF WRITER SRR722@CABRINI EDU

Free room and board and a room all to yourself, who wouldn’t want that? Roommates can be aggravating and room and board is expensive. These things would make it seem like being an RA is worth it, but of course, as with everything in life, with the good comes some bad. Sure, your own room and free room and board is great, but the position comes with a great deal of responsibility and annoyances.

between the two, but it would probably be very difficult to find.

I think the RAs deserve more respect than they get, but sometimes they make it difficult. If you blur the line between friend and authority figure, sometimes that can screw you over.

The whole situation can put everyone in awkward situations at times. Say you got caught drinking and the RA that busted you was a friend of yours. It puts the RA in a difficult position because they have a job to do and they have to stick to it, but at the same time, who wants to get their friend in trouble?

NEWS EDITOR

ACC722@CABRINI EDU

Remember when the most challenging part of your afternoon was making sure to match the colors with the numbers and to concentrate on coloring within each line? And nothing was as important to you as your cabbage patch baby-doll or super Nintendo Mario Bros game.

The most difficult choice you had to make each day was whether or not you wanted peanut butter and jelly for lunch or cheese and mustard. Back when you would get rewarded with money for every tooth you lost or ice cream with sprinkles for finishing the peas off of your dinner plate.

The only war you would have to worry about is the card game and “Life” was just the name of a game you played where you could instantly become a billionaire just from the role of the dice.

You wouldn’t have a cell phone because you didn’t need one, all of your friends lived on the same street; mommy or daddy were al- ways only a couple of steps away from you. And bathtime was an adventure in itself, especially those special occasions when your mom let you fill up the water to the tippy- top.

Rewind back to present day reality. Now the most challenging part of your afternoon is if your going to finish all of your assignments and still make it to work on time. Nothing is more important to you then your blackberry and making sure you keep a good relationship with your professors.

The most difficult choice you have to make each day is whether or not that chocolate brownie is going to make work out time extra strenuous or if you should just suck it up and eat freeze dried vegetables because they are the lowest in calories. Sure you can still reward yourself with ice cream and sprinkles, but it just doesn’t have the same exciting effect it once had.

But what if we all took the time to realize how important it is to just kick it?

Sit back and relax once and a while and be immature like we once were as kids. Now that we have mastered coloring, wouldn’t it be a great idea to just use it today as something to calm our nerves when we are upset?

Or to pop in an old Disney movie like “The Little Mermaid” and sing along to “Under the Sea” and all the other Disney songs that still continue to bring a smile to our face. Sure we won’t be in need of rubber ducky anymore, but it still feels nice to take the time to enjoy a hot bubble bath once in a while.

Maybe our lives here in college could be a lot less stressful if we remember our youth. I know nine times out of 10 our lives can become overwhelming with the overflow of work, relationships, personal and public life, but we should still remember it is important to have some one on one time with yourself.

We’re never going to be able to get rid of all of the stress that comes with growing up but keeping yourself happy and healthy is the most important thing you can ever learn. Too much stress is never a healthy thing. So put the paper aside for a second, grab a pint of Ben and Jerry’s and indulge. You can always worry about it tomorrow.

Personally, I don’t think I could even be an RA. For some, it seems so simple and they have the easiest time with it, but others can’t. I wouldn’t want to have to deal with telling other students what to do. Once you get to college, you really don’t want someone telling what you can and cannot do.

You always see residents disrespecting their RAs and not taking them seriously. I think it’s hard to gain the respect from the residents. If you’re too strict, they won’t like you, but if you’re too lenient, they’ll love you but you put your job at risk. I’m sure there’s a happy middle point

Also, it brings up the question if the RA will even get taken seriously. If you were friends with the RA and they told you to get rid of whatever alcohol you had, would you think they were kidding or serious? You don’t want to put your job at risk and you don’t want to piss off your friends. There have been many times I’ve seen RAs tell people to turn the music down or get rid of their alcohol and the residents will just laugh in their faces.

Like I said, I could never deal with it. Finding the proper balance between being a good friend and doing your job seems like it would be very difficult and I give credit to those who have figured it out. It’s a tough job, but someone has to do it.