Monthly Archives: November 2018

Know your enemy: HIV-1 reservoir in the spotlight

Budding HIV particles,TEM

HIV-1 forms a reservoir that persists despite prolonged therapy and is considered the main barrier to an HIV cure. Various methods to measure HIV-1 reservoir in infected individuals have been developed, but the field is still searching for better ways. The recent review collection in Retrovirology “Measuring HIV-1 persistence in vivo”, edited by Dr. Alexander Pasternak and Prof. Ben Berkhout, summarizes our current understanding of HIV-1 persistence and tools to measure it.

Health Medicine

Gut damage and dysbiosis as hallmarks of HIV pathogenesis

Microbiota in human intestine

December 1st is World AIDS Day. To mark the occasion we invited a series of blogs by authors and editors from Retrovirology and AIDS Research and Therapy to talk about the latest research into the treatment and prevention of HIV/AIDS. In this blog Dr Giulia Marchetti and Dr Camilla Tincati tell us about the gastrointestinal issues facing HIV patients being treated with combination antiretroviral therapy and the research being done to solve this.

Health Medicine

Sauna bathing associated with lower risk of cardiovascular death among men and women

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New research published in BMC Medicine finds sauna bathing can reduce the risk of fatal cardiovascular events among women, a finding that was only previously shown in men. Dr. Jari A. Laukkanen, lead author of the paper says that sauna bathing can be considered an additional healthy habit to enable prediction of cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk on top of common risk factors and physical activity. In this blog he tells us more about his team’s findings.

Health Medicine

Assessing the effect of antimalarial medicines on the heart’s rhythm

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Malaria is the leading cause of parasitic disease, killing nearly half a million people per year, most of whom are African children. Recent figures from the World Health Organization indicate that the decline in the number of infections and deaths annually has stalled. We are once again at a critical time where commitment and the co-ordinated use of all available tools to control malaria are essential to reversing this worrying trend.

Medicine

Being around vapers does not undermine desire to quit smoking

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The rise in popularity of e-cigarettes is a contentious topic. Are they good because they’re a safer alternative to conventional cigarettes? Or are they bad because they renormalize smoking, making it harder for smokers to quit? Research published today in BMC Medicine, looking at over 12,000 smokers, unexpectedly found that those who were regularly exposed to e-cigarette use by others were more likely to be highly motivated to quit. Here the lead author, Sarah Jackson, tells us more.

Health Medicine