Anti-HIV gel is declared breakthrough for women

Touchdown

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Mon Jul-19-10 10:35 PM
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Anti-HIV gel is declared breakthrough for women

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2010-07-19-anti-hiv-gel_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip

More than a decade of failure and frustration ended Monday with a report that a new vaginal gel gives women the power to reduce their risk of contracting HIV and genital herpes without relying on their male partner to use a condom.

The experimental gel is made with Gilead Sciences' antiviral drug tenofovir, which is widely used for treating HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. Applying the 1% tenofovir gel 12 hours before and 12 hours after sex reduced a woman's risk of HIV infection by 39% over the course of 2½ years.

The gel also reduced the risk of genital herpes by 51%, an unexpected bonus because women with herpes are twice as likely to be infected with HIV.

"We now have a product that can potentially alter the epidemic and save millions of lives," says Quarraisha Abdool Karim of the University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa, who co-wrote the study with her husband and university colleague, Salim Abdool Karim.

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Touchdown

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Tue Jul-20-10 11:30 AM
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1. Kicking for next day's crowd.

:kick:

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gratuitous

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Tue Jul-20-10 11:35 AM
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2. Countdown to the misogynists' objection in 5 . . . 4 . . . 3 . . .

Somehow or other, men who desperately need to control women and their bodies will come up with a cockamamie rationale (look for something dressed up in religious garb) to object to use of this gel, so that more women can die prematurely.

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