Approximately 5 to 6 million South Africans are infected with HIV. Nineteen percent of the country’s adult population aged between 15 and 49 carries the deadly virus. Unfortunately, only one-third of the HIV infected South Africans have access to antiretroviral therapy (ART) despite of an AIDS prevention program supported by the South African government in collaboration with US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS. According to a study by researchers of Massachusetts General Hospital, more than 1.2 million deaths from AIDS could be prevented in South Africa in the next five years by accelerating efforts to provide access to ART.

The researchers had shown in their study that by maintaining the current treatment capacity there would be 2.4 million AIDS-related deaths by 2012. By rapidly increasing access to ART and by 2011 if all patients have access to ART, then the number of AIDS-related deaths would drop to 1.2 million by 2012. If immediately full access to ART were provided then in the same period the number of deaths would fall drastically to 800,000.

The life cycle of the HIV can be as short as 1.5 days – from the time the virus enters a cell, its replication, assembly, release of additional virus to infection to other cells. The HIV are known to mutate very rapidly with the resulting mutants often being more superior to the parent virus and even have the capability of being resilient to the antiretroviral drugs. ART primarily consists of a combination of antiretroviral drugs, as no individual antiretroviral drug is known to suppress an HIV infection for long.

Source:Biology News Net
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