Hip
Senior Member
- Messages
- 17,657
@Ellkaye
One other thing you have not addressed in this antiretroviral theories of ME/CFS as that ME/CFS patients who are also on antiretrovirals for HIV infection do not seem to improve as a result of their antiretroviral regimen.
One needs to ask why.
Now I guess it is possible that not all antiretrovirals effectively target the gammaretroviruses (like murine leukemia virus and feline leukemia virus) speculated to be involved in ME/CFS. (Dr Sidney Grossberg in 2001 found JHK retrovirus, from the murine leukemia virus family, in one ME/CFS patient; he is still working on JHK in ME/CFS.)
The drugs you are taking do inhibit feline leukemia virus:
Raltegravir inhibits feline leukemia virus (ref: 1) and tenofovir inhibits feline leukemia virus (ref: 1)
Interestingly that second study also discovered that the anti-cancer drugs decitabine and gemcitabine inhibit feline leukemia virus.
But I am not sure if other antiretroviral drugs that HIV patients commonly use also have anti-gammaretrovirus and anti-leukemia virus effects.
So if we assume there is a leukemia virus-type retrovirus in some ME/CFS patients, I guess only certain HIV antiretroviral drugs like raltegravir and tenofovir might be effective against it. So that might explain why ME/CFS patients who also have HIV do not see an improvement in their ME/CFS symptoms from the antiretrovirals — because they are not taking the right antiretrovirals which target leukemia virus-type retroviruses.
A good list of anti-retrovirals fro HIV is give here. Perhaps you might want to check and Google search through them, and see if any others have anti-leukemia virus effects.
EDIT: I have done this search for you: the Boolean Google searches here and here cover all the HIV antiretrovirals listed in the above link, and look to see if they inhibit gammaretroviruses and leukemia virus-types retroviruses. Most do not appear to, apart from a new drug called elvitegravir (Vitekta) (ref: 1)
One other thing you have not addressed in this antiretroviral theories of ME/CFS as that ME/CFS patients who are also on antiretrovirals for HIV infection do not seem to improve as a result of their antiretroviral regimen.
One needs to ask why.
Now I guess it is possible that not all antiretrovirals effectively target the gammaretroviruses (like murine leukemia virus and feline leukemia virus) speculated to be involved in ME/CFS. (Dr Sidney Grossberg in 2001 found JHK retrovirus, from the murine leukemia virus family, in one ME/CFS patient; he is still working on JHK in ME/CFS.)
The drugs you are taking do inhibit feline leukemia virus:
Raltegravir inhibits feline leukemia virus (ref: 1) and tenofovir inhibits feline leukemia virus (ref: 1)
Interestingly that second study also discovered that the anti-cancer drugs decitabine and gemcitabine inhibit feline leukemia virus.
But I am not sure if other antiretroviral drugs that HIV patients commonly use also have anti-gammaretrovirus and anti-leukemia virus effects.
So if we assume there is a leukemia virus-type retrovirus in some ME/CFS patients, I guess only certain HIV antiretroviral drugs like raltegravir and tenofovir might be effective against it. So that might explain why ME/CFS patients who also have HIV do not see an improvement in their ME/CFS symptoms from the antiretrovirals — because they are not taking the right antiretrovirals which target leukemia virus-type retroviruses.
A good list of anti-retrovirals fro HIV is give here. Perhaps you might want to check and Google search through them, and see if any others have anti-leukemia virus effects.
EDIT: I have done this search for you: the Boolean Google searches here and here cover all the HIV antiretrovirals listed in the above link, and look to see if they inhibit gammaretroviruses and leukemia virus-types retroviruses. Most do not appear to, apart from a new drug called elvitegravir (Vitekta) (ref: 1)
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