Suggestion for HIV drug testing

[Andrew]

I don't know who to email this too. Maybe someone else can act on this. It seems to me that the first HIV drug they should test would be the one with the least amount of side effects, In fact, it could also be one of the ones that is not the most effective with HIV. For all we know, it might be effective with XMRV.

OTOH, if drug companies test, I guess we have no choice. But maybe Klimas (who knows about AIDS drugs) could team up with Singh (who is testing drugs) and maybe good things could happen.

 

[Kati]

Andrew, they are smart people- they know what to do!

 

[Andrew]

If Raltegravir and AZT are examples of the lowest risk HIV drugs out there, I guess I'll have to wait for a new drug to come out.

 

[Hope123]

An intermediate step might be to isolate XMRV from positive CFS sufferers and test that first in vitro rather than have people just take antiretrovirals. As far as I understand, to date XMRV tested has not been that from folks with CFS but from lab stock. Since we know so very little about XMRV at the moment, it would make sense to test isolated XMRV rather than assume XMRV from sufferers are the same as lab stock. The analogy is testing different antibiotics against isolated bacteria from a sick patient in the lab to narrow down which antibiotics work and at which dose before giving them to the patient. This latter process is done all the time when treating patients with serious bacterial infections.