Hiv Virus

Fewer Americans than previously thought are controlling their HIV infections and potentially putting the public at higher risk, according to a new study from Johns Hopkins University and University of Pennsylvania. The researchers found that there are tens of thousands of people - particularly young adults, blacks, injection drug users and the uninsured - that are not consistently suppressing their viral loads. Mostly, they are not adhering to their drug regimens. And when patients go on and off their medications, they can become resistant to therapy and put other people in greater danger of contracting the virus that causes AIDS.

An Edgemere man pleaded guilty Wednesday to having sexual contact with a teenage boy, in a plea deal that allowed him to avoid trial on a rarely used charge of exposing a victim to the HIV virus. Steven Douglas Podles, 36, was charged after police said he engaged in sexual activity with a 13-year-old outside the teen's home in February 2012. Podles had been treated for HIV, prosecutors said, but the boy did not contract the disease. The two met on Grindr, an adult dating app that requires users to be 18 or older.

An Edgemere man pleaded guilty Wednesday to having sexual contact with a teenage boy, in a plea deal that allowed him to avoid trial on a rarely used charge of exposing a victim to the HIV virus. Steven Douglas Podles, 36, was charged after police said he engaged in sexual activity with a 13-year-old outside the teen's home in February 2012. Podles had been treated for HIV, prosecutors said, but the boy did not contract the disease. The two met on Grindr, an adult dating app that requires users to be 18 or older.

When police accused an Edgemere man of having sex with a 13-year-old boy, most of the charges were straightforward: soliciting a minor and a related sexual offense, which together could carry up to 30 years in prison. But Baltimore County prosecutors also accused Steven Douglas Podles of knowingly attempting to transmit the HIV virus to the boy - a seldom-used, and often controversial, charge that carries an additional three years behind bars. Even as prosecutors prepare their case against Podles, the effectiveness of such laws is being debated by legislators and public health officials from Maryland to California.

Profectus BioSciences Inc., a Baltimore-based biotechnology company, said Wednesday that it won a $5.6 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to support the development of a vaccine for a pair of contagious and deadly viruses that the U.S. government has classified as biological and agricultural threats. The viruses are found in other parts of the world. The viruses — Nipah and Hendra — are closely related and cause respiratory and encephalitic disease in humans and animals.

WITH A magician, the hand is always quicker than the eye. But with Magic Johnson, the smile is quicker than the I.The dazzle of that smile seems to have blinded some people to the egotistical essence of Earvin "Magic" Johnson's having tested positive for the HIV virus that causes AIDS. He has been hailed by many as a "hero," when hedonist might be the better word.In explaining why he recently tested positive for the human immunodeficiency virus, he acknowledges that he can't be specific."I am certain," he wrote in last week's Sports Illustrated, "that I was infected by having unprotected sex with a woman who has the virus.

When police accused an Edgemere man of having sex with a 13-year-old boy, most of the charges were straightforward: soliciting a minor and a related sexual offense, which together could carry up to 30 years in prison. But Baltimore County prosecutors also accused Steven Douglas Podles of knowingly attempting to transmit the HIV virus to the boy - a seldom-used, and often controversial, charge that carries an additional three years behind bars. Even as prosecutors prepare their case against Podles, the effectiveness of such laws is being debated by legislators and public health officials from Maryland to California.

A man charged with abducting and raping two women at gunpoint and wanted for questioning in six other sexual assaults was being sought last night by police.Investigators have received unconfirmed reports that the suspect has the HIV virus, causing alarm in the North Baltimore area where he is believed to have committed the attacks.Brian Avery Beard, 24, whose last known address was the 2600 block of Springhill Ave., is charged in warrants with first-degree rape, first-degree sex offense, perverted practice and false imprisonment, court records showed.

OPTIMISM DOMINATED the recent gathering of 15,000 AIDS scientists and health professionals in Vancouver, British Columbia, and for good reason. For the first time, there is more than a glimmer of hope that the damage done by the HIV virus can be dramatically reduced to the point that death is not an inevitable consequence.Still, there is no cure. But some of the research holds enormous promise to turn AIDS into a manageable, treatable condition. The most notable advance is a three-drug "cocktail" that includes a "protease inhibitor" to block an enzyme critical to the reproduction of the HIV virus.

SOME researchers are calling it a "miracle," others aren't so sure. Whatever the case turns out to be, reports that a Los Angeles infant infected with the AIDS virus at birth cast off the infection by the age of 1 represent one of the few bright spots in the uphill struggle against the deadly epidemic.How the child, now a healthy and normal 5 1/2 -year-old kindergarten pupil, managed to rid himself of the virus remains a mystery. The boy evidently fought off the HIV infection with his natural immune defenses.

Fewer Americans than previously thought are controlling their HIV infections and potentially putting the public at higher risk, according to a new study from Johns Hopkins University and University of Pennsylvania. The researchers found that there are tens of thousands of people - particularly young adults, blacks, injection drug users and the uninsured - that are not consistently suppressing their viral loads. Mostly, they are not adhering to their drug regimens. And when patients go on and off their medications, they can become resistant to therapy and put other people in greater danger of contracting the virus that causes AIDS.

Profectus BioSciences Inc., a Baltimore-based biotechnology company, said Wednesday that it won a $5.6 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to support the development of a vaccine for a pair of contagious and deadly viruses that the U.S. government has classified as biological and agricultural threats. The viruses are found in other parts of the world. The viruses — Nipah and Hendra — are closely related and cause respiratory and encephalitic disease in humans and animals.

By hunting and handling fresh primate meat, thousands of rural Africans might be infected with a virus in the same general category as HIV, according to a new study by researchers at Johns Hopkins University and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The study is the first to document virus transmission from primates to humans in a natural setting. "This is the first real-world evidence that these viruses cross species boundaries. And this appears to be something that is happening regularly," said the study's lead author, Nathan Wolfe, an epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

THE MOST widely heralded event at the recent international AIDS conference in Durban, South Africa, was the announcement that Merck, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Glaxo Wellcome, Roche and other large pharmaceutical corporations and charitable foundations would provide drugs for the treatment of HIV to poor African countries at low cost. Unfortunately, the short-term benefits of this well-meaning gesture carry the potential threat of an even greater long-term human tragedy. At the moment, there is no cure for HIV, nor is one expected soon.

LONDON -- ''We can't claim victory until the fat lady really sings,'' said Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, at the 11th international conference on AIDS in Vancouver. ''She hasn't sung yet, but I think she is getting ready to sing.''This month's Vancouver conference marked the first time that researchers think they are getting close to effective treatments for AIDS and its precursor, HIV infection. New combinations of drugs, particularly the class known as protease-inhibitors, are producing startling cases of remission from full-blown AIDS, and have reduced the HIV virus in the blood of HIV-positive people to undetectable levels for up to half a year.

OPTIMISM DOMINATED the recent gathering of 15,000 AIDS scientists and health professionals in Vancouver, British Columbia, and for good reason. For the first time, there is more than a glimmer of hope that the damage done by the HIV virus can be dramatically reduced to the point that death is not an inevitable consequence.Still, there is no cure. But some of the research holds enormous promise to turn AIDS into a manageable, treatable condition. The most notable advance is a three-drug "cocktail" that includes a "protease inhibitor" to block an enzyme critical to the reproduction of the HIV virus.

For a world hanging on every word, Magic Johnson's agent says Johnson is well and vacationing with his wife, Cookie, at a secret site."He's just going to stay away until he wants to come back," Lon Rosen said.Rosen says Johnson will begin taking the drug AZT upon his return, adding that doctors have said it isn't important to start immediately.Although no action was taken until initial results were confirmed, Rosen says Johnson first learned that he had tested positive for the HIV virus after returning alone from the Lakers' preseason trip to Salt Lake City on Oct. 25."

The nature of the site in the human body that permits the AIDS virus to enter and begin its destruction has been revealed in detail by two independent research teams led by scientists from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in Bethesda.Their work, published in today's issue of the journal, Nature, unravels some of the mystery that surrounds the AIDS virus' target and paves the way for the development of new drugs to prevent the human immunodeficiency virus from gaining access to the site, known as CD4.Denied access to its target, the HIV virus would be harmless.

SOME researchers are calling it a "miracle," others aren't so sure. Whatever the case turns out to be, reports that a Los Angeles infant infected with the AIDS virus at birth cast off the infection by the age of 1 represent one of the few bright spots in the uphill struggle against the deadly epidemic.How the child, now a healthy and normal 5 1/2 -year-old kindergarten pupil, managed to rid himself of the virus remains a mystery. The boy evidently fought off the HIV infection with his natural immune defenses.

"Before we brought Shanice home," Iris Thorpe is saying, "we told all our friends that we were going to adopt a little girl and that she [might have] the HIV virus. We wanted to know their reactions, you know?"So all of my friends were saying things like, 'We know you're not going to let that stop you!' And, 'All kids need love.' And things like that. And I'm saying, 'Hey! We're still going to do it. We were just trying to check you out.' ""So, you didn't get any negative reactions at all?