New reports Fewer HIV cases in India
Fri, 06 Jul 2007 17:03:13 GMT
By SAM DOLNICK, Associated Press Writer
NEW DELHI - The experts' consensus was that India had the most HIV cases in the world — 5.7 million — and that number could rise if aggressive measures weren't adopted.
On Friday, that consensus changed dramatically when international AIDS experts and Indian health officials revealed new data showing India to have less than half of that number — 2.5 million people — infected with HIV.
Despite the lower number of HIV cases, the government and the international community are paying more attention — and more money — to fighting AIDS in India. The Indian health minister on Friday announced a new phase of the federal AIDS control program, with the Indian government pledging $1.95 billion — nearly 40 times what it spent in the last round.
This new plan has an expected budget of $2.8 billion, and has attracted high-profile donors, including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Clinton Foundation and the U.N. Development Program. The previous plan, announced in 1999, had a budget of less than $350 million.
The inflated HIV numbers were actually good for India, said Health Minister Anubani Ramadoss. "This has helped us. This has put more pressure on us. Due to this pressure, now I have got a healthy budget."
And the epidemic is far from over, he said.
"It doesn't make a difference whether it's 1 million or 10 million," Ramadoss said. "The fact of the matter is there's a problem with HIV in India."
The reduced numbers come from expanded surveys and an improved methodology, providing a far more accurate — and more encouraging — portrait of India's HIV epidemic, said Ramadoss. Experts from the United Nations and the World Health Organization endorsed the new data.
An earlier U.N. study estimated 5.7 million HIV cases, which would have been the highest total in the world. According to the new data, India, which has a population of 1.1 billion, has fewer HIV cases than South Africa and Nigeria.
The new estimates were compiled after greatly expanding the number of clinics surveyed and incorporating data from a far-reaching national household survey.
"We are today a lot more confident that what is being presented to you is closer to the true prevalence as it exists in the population," said Peter Ghys, manager of epidemic and impact monitoring at UNAIDS.
While the new HIV estimates were a result of statistical breakthroughs more than medical ones, Ramadoss said that India's HIV-infection rate showed cause for optimism with a decline from about .38 percent of the population in 2002 to about .36 percent now.
Most encouragingly, HIV rates in southern states, where the disease was most prevalent, have stabilized or begun to decline, Ramadoss said, crediting targeted interventions and education outreach programs.
The infection rate remains above 1 percent in several southern states, including Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka, although it is less than 1 percent in Tamil Nadu. Rates remain high among sex workers, their customers, and men who have sex with men.
Ramadoss said the epidemic was far from over.
The new HIV estimates come from an expanded survey of prenatal clinics, sexually transmitted infection clinics and public hospitals. The figures also incorporate data from the government's National Family Health Survey, which covers about 200,000 people ages 15 to 54, and was conducted through face-to-face interviews across India between December 2005 and August 2006.
The third phase of India's AIDS control program set forth a strategy for fighting HIV and AIDS in the next five years. In addition to the Indian government, it will be funded by the U.S. government, the Gates Foundation, the Clinton Foundation, WHO and other groups.
The plan will focus on AIDS education, promotion of the use of condoms, and the establishment of an improved blood transfusion system, among other areas.
The program focuses more on HIV prevention than treatment for HIV patients, a deliberate choice that Ramadoss said was critical for the country.
"We have about 600 million youths below 25, so first we need to save them," he said.
Gore arrest highlights Rx drug abuse
Fri, 06 Jul 2007 06:09:06 GMT
By CARLA K. JOHNSON, Associated Press Writer
CHICAGO - Drug abuse experts say the arrest of Al Gore's son underscores the growing problem of prescription drug abuse among America's youth. College students use the stimulant Adderall, an attention deficit drug, to get a speedy high or pull all-nighters.
The other drugs police say they found in Al Gore III's possession — marijuana, Xanax, Valium and Vicodin — also are campus favorites, experts say.
"Al Gore's son is just like everyone else's," said Dr. Donald Misch, director of health services at Northwestern University in Evanston. "The only thing missing was the No. 1 abused drug, which is alcohol."
Students commonly pair pills with beer and cigarettes, experts say. They trade tips about the effects of prescription drugs on networking sites like Facebook and trade pills they've stolen from home medicine cabinets, ordered on the Internet or taken from friends with legitimate prescriptions.
Prescription drug abuse among 18- to 25-year-olds rose 17 percent from 2002 to 2005, according to the White House drug policy office. In 2004 and again in 2005, there were more new abusers of prescription drugs than new users of any illicit drug.
Young people mistakenly believe prescription drugs are safer than street drugs, doctors say. But accidental prescription drug deaths are rising and students who abuse pills are more likely to drive fast, binge-drink and engage in other dangerous behaviors.
The White House plans a national advertising campaign aimed at getting parents to clean out their medicine cabinets and lock up any prescription drugs they need, said deputy drug czar Scott Burns.
"We found in focus groups of young people across the country that in large measure they're getting the drugs from their own medicine cabinets and the Internet," Burns said. Some Web pharmacies deliver ordered drugs without legitimate prescriptions, but other sites steal credit card information and never fill orders, Burns said.
Nearly 60 percent of Americans who report abusing prescription drugs say they get them from friends or family, according to the 2006 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, the largest survey on substance abuse in the country with about 70,000 participants.
According to another survey, the 2005 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, there are 14.6 million current marijuana users and 6.4 million prescription drug abusers, with most prescription drug abusers using painkillers such as Vicodin. Cocaine ranked third, with 2.4 million current users.
The same survey found the annual average number of new abusers of prescription pain relievers was 2.4 million, edging out the 2.1 million new users of marijuana.
Al Gore III, 24, was driving about 100 mph on the San Diego Freeway when he was pulled over Wednesday. He was arrested for illegally possessing marijuana and prescription drugs. While a student at Harvard University, he was arrested in 2003 for marijuana possession.
Former Vice President Al Gore said Thursday his son is getting treatment.
"We're very happy that he's sought and is getting the treatment that he needs," Gore said on CNN's "Larry King Live" Thursday. "And beyond that, we appreciate the good wishes that have come our way."
The drugs police say they found when they searched the young Gore's car are commonly found on campus, according to experts.
Vicodin, a brand name for acetaminophen and hydrocodone, is a painkiller that works by attaching to opioid receptors in the brain; it can be addictive and can bring on a feeling of euphoria when abused. Xanax and Valium are both used to treat anxiety and can cause withdrawal symptoms when stopped suddenly; they produce feelings of relaxation or drowsiness.
Adderall is used to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and can cause sudden death or serious heart problems, especially if misused. Students crush and snort it to get a fast rush or swallow the pills to stay awake for a late night of studying.
Abuse of Adderall and other prescription stimulants is more common on college campuses than among young adults not attending college, experts say.
Prosecutors said Thursday they have until Aug. 1 to decide whether to file charges against Gore's son.
A study published in the medical journal Addiction in 2005 found that rates of abuse of prescription stimulants including Adderall were higher at northeastern colleges and schools with more competitive admission standards. About 4 percent of college students in that study reported non-medical use of prescription stimulants in the past year.
Al Gore III's arrest may raise awareness among parents, Misch said.
"This is an opportunity for people to understand this is happening in your household," he said. "These are your kids. The drug dealers they're going to are their doctors, their parents and their friends."
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On the Net:
Office of National Drug Control Policy: http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov
How to find treatment: http://dasis3.samhsa.gov/
Wash. to set medical marijuana limits
Thu, 05 Jul 2007 10:51:02 GMT
By CURT WOODWARD, Associated Press Writer
SEATTLE - This fall, sober public servants will convene meetings across Washington state to answer a pressing question: How much marijuana constitutes a two-month supply?
What may seem like an odd question for straight-laced government types to tackle is a serious attempt to shore up the state's medical marijuana law, which has been around for nearly a decade without defining the 60-day supply patients are allowed to have on hand.
Now, after years of attempts to amend the law, the state Health Department has been ordered to spell out how much marijuana makes up that theoretical two-month cache.
Prosecutors and police generally support the change, saying it should help officers determine whom to arrest and whom to leave alone.
The American Civil Liberties Union and some state lawmakers think it could be the beginning of even broader reforms by the state's Democratic-controlled Legislature.
But some patients wish the state wouldn't bother, spooked the government will make the limits too restrictive and cause more arrests for people in frail health.
If the law is going to be changed, dissenters would rather see stronger protection from arrest or an allowance for group growing operations. Defining the 60-day supply, they say, is a do-nothing compromise aimed mostly at pleasing law enforcement.
"Once again, politics have trumped patients' rights. Once again, politics have trumped science," said Dale Rogers, head of Seattle's Compassion in Action Patient Network, which distributes medical marijuana.
Washington's medical marijuana law was approved by nearly 60 percent of voters in 1998, following closely behind California in the first wave of such measures nationwide.
Under the law, doctors are allowed to recommend marijuana for people suffering from "intractable pain" and several serious diseases, including cancer, AIDS and multiple sclerosis.
Marijuana patients can be prosecuted but may avoid conviction by proving a legitimate medical need. As is the case anywhere in the country, nothing in state statute shields a patient from prosecution under federal law, which does not recognize medical uses for marijuana.
Unlike the 11 other laws that protect medical marijuana users from a state criminal conviction, Washington has never set a specific limit for the amount of pot each patient is allowed to have.
In Oregon, patients are allowed up to 24 ounces of pot and two dozen plants at different stages of growth. New Mexico, the latest state to pass a medical marijuana law, plans to allow up to six ounces of marijuana, four mature plants and three immature seedlings.
"Law enforcement officers in the field were put in the position of throwing their hands up in the air and saying, `We'll let the judge and the jury sort that out,'" said Alison Holcomb, director of the state ACLU's Marijuana Education Project.
An activist group highlighted the confusion around Washington's law last year when it asked county officials how many plants medical marijuana patients were allowed for growing their own supply.
One county said the answer was easy: zero. Others had formulas that accounted for the different stages of plant growth.
"The truth is, nobody's number had any legal precedence or greater validity than your number or my number," said Tom McBride, executive secretary of the Washington Association of Prosecuting Attorneys.
In some cases, the gray area has served as a legal shield, allowing patients and their doctors to argue in court over how much marijuana they need, said Douglas Hiatt, a defense lawyer who specializes in medical marijuana cases.
"We can't have an outside health authority dictate to our doctors how much a patient should use," Rogers said.
Adding to the debate, marijuana varies in potency, and different users use different amounts.
Ric Smith, a longtime medical marijuana user from Seattle, typically lights up before meals to treat the nausea that comes with his HIV medication.
In any given week, Smith burns through anywhere from seven grams to about an ounce. Without it, even the smallest disturbance can be too much to handle, he says.
"When you're at the top of the roller coaster and you just start over the other edge? It's that feeling, 24 hours a day," Smith said. "A pin drop, a bird flying by, a butterfly landing on your nose — anything will make you throw up."
Hiatt and others who will lobby health regulators this fall will cite a marijuana dosing study led by Dr. Gregory Carte, a University of Washington rehabilitation-medicine specialist.
Following the study's guidelines, Hiatt said, patients should be allowed anywhere from a half-pound to 2 3/4 pounds of marijuana in two months. If the Health Department goes drastically lower, Hiatt said a lawsuit could follow.
"I know the people of Washington state didn't want lawyers and judges and prosecutors arguing about little piddly details like this," Hiatt said. "Is the person sick? Yes. Are they using it with a doctor's permission? Yes. Then leave them alone."
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On the Net:
ACLU: http://www.aclu-wa.org
Washington Association of Prosecuting Attorneys: http://www.waprosecutors.org
Marijuana Policy Project: http://www.mpp.org