HIV Information

Are there treatments for HIV/AIDS?

For many years, there were no effective treatments for AIDS. Today, people in developed countries can use a number of drugs to treat HIV infection and AIDS. Some of these are designed to treat the opportunistic infections and illnesses that affect people with HIV/AIDS. In addition, several types of drugs seek to prevent HIV from reproducing and destroying the body's immune system:

·       Reverse transcriptase inhibitors attack an HIV enzyme called reverse transcriptase. They include abacavir, delavirdine, didanosine (ddI), efavirenz, emtricitabine( FTC), lamivudine (3TC), nevirapine, stavudine (d4T), tenofovir, zalcitabine (ddC), and zidovudine (AZT);

·       Protease inhibitors attack the HIV enzyme protease and include amprenavir, atazanavir, fosamprevavir, indinavir, lopinavir, nelfinavir, ritonavir, and saquinavir.

·       Fusion inhibitors stop virus from entering cells. To date, there is only one fusion inhibitor approved by the Food and Drug Administration, enfuvirtide.

Many HIV patients take these drugs in combination in a regimen known as highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART). When taken as directed, these drugs can reduce the level of HIV in the bloodstream to very low levels and enable the body's CD4 immune cells to rebound to normal levels.

Researchers are continuing to develop new drugs that act at critical steps in the life cycle of the virus. Efforts are also underway to identify new targets for anti-HIV medications and to discover ways of restoring the ability of damaged immune systems to defend against HIV and the many illnesses that affect people with HIV. Ultimately, advances in rebuilding the immune system in HIV patients will benefit people with a number of serious illnesses, including cancer, Alzheimer's disease, multiple sclerosis, and immune deficiencies associated with aging and premature birth.