HIV / AIDS in Practice: When to

HIV / AIDS in Practice: When to Start Therapy, a Clinical Context Report Article from "MedPage Today" The writer, Mr. Smith, interviewed Dr. Myron Cohen of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill about the treatment of HIV / AIDS. Dr. Cohen says that the guideline from International Antiviral Society and DHSS (Department of Health and Human Services) treatment for HIV need to be started immediately after the diagnosis regardless of the CD4 cell count. HIV treatment involves different steps.

First and foremost is for people to have a test for HIV detection. Once it is detected, treatment should be started. HIV and AIDS are two different diseases. HIV can be controlled and a person can lead a normal life. However, there are side effects of HIV treatment as well like it produces elite controllers i.e. patients who will progress towards AIDS slowly or not at all. But despite the low HIV viral cells, they might suffer from organ damage.

The study shows that earl treatment prevents heterosexual transmissions to be non-contagious. The drugs used for HIV are not one-size-fit-all; they are given according to the medical history of the patient. Analysis Estimate by United Nation shows that 34 million people have human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which causes AIDS. In 2011, the funding for the treatment and prevention of HIV was $16.8 billion. 48% of this amount was donated by United States i.e. $8.2 billion. The poor and middle-income countries spent around $8.6 million.

United Nations estimates that in order to achieve the goals related to elimination of HIV, another $5 million are required (Beasley & Miles, 2012). So according to the article under discussion, the cost of HIV treatment will increase. However, the immediate treatment cuts of the cost of tests for CD4 cell count since its position is only as a surrogate. The doctor will not be required to monitor the CD4 cell count a required in the earlier treatments.

The earlier the treatment starts, better are the chances of eradicating HIV in a patient. The drugs suggested for this early start of treatment are efavirenz and abacavir/lamivudine. Today, less people have to die due to HIV infection because more people have access to antiretroviral drugs even in the sub-Saharan Africa.

According to an article by Beasley & Miles (2012) 8 million people have access to the drugs for HIV out of 15 million (Altman, 2012) patients in the poor and lower-income countries Easy access even in remote areas will enable the doctors to start the treatment of their patients as soon as HIV is detected. If a patient stops taking medicine for HIV even for a small time period, they can start transmitting it to other people (2012).

So in light of the article under discussion, early treatment is more beneficial but requires an easy access to all the patients, not only for those in United States. People want to get tested for HIV so that they know if they might infect other people. United States is working for AIDS-free generation, thus there have been questions raised at conference that United States is providing uninfected Americans with HIV drugs when there are many poor people suffering from AIDS are deprived of it (Altman, 2012).

Although the quality of treatment is improved day by day, still a lot of work needs to be done. It is essential to provide equal treatment to all HIV patients and consider every one of them to.