Viljoen speaks up for SA children at International Workshop on HIV in Paediatrics

Mrs Michelle Viljoen.

  The results were from a clinical research study conducted over a 24 month follow-up in antiretroviral (ARV) naïve children who commenced with the first line treatment regimen (efavirenz, lamivudine and stavudine) at Harriet Shezi Children’s Clinic, Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital.  The title of the presentation was Efavirenz plasma concentrations during 24 month follow-up post-ARV in HIV-infected South African children. 
  This Paediatric workshop was held as a pre-satellite workshop prior to the 6th International AIDS Society (IAS) Conference on HIV Pathogenesis, Treatment and Prevention, Rome, Italy (17-20 July 2011). 
  This 6th IAS was marked as a “Landmark” HIV conference and was attended by over 5 000 delegates from all over the world with expert speakers and researchers such as Nobel Laureate Francois Barré-Sinoussi from France.  The president of the IAS said at the opening: “We have witnessed two years of significant biomedical advances, the likes of which we have not seen since the antiretroviral breakthroughs of the mid-1990s”
  The focus of the conference was wide and included sessions on treatment and prevention of HIV and AIDS related diseases.  The UNAIDS Executive Director, Michel Sidibe, said: “Sceptics are saying that expanding treatment is risky and unsustainable.  What is truly risky, truly unsustainable, is waiting for treatment.” His response to the concern regarding funding and the global response was: “We pay now, or we pay forever!”