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SOUTHERN VOICE NOVEMBER3/1994
Hormone helps PWAs gain weight
San Francisco—Injecting AIDS patients
with a growth hormone can reverse the “wast
ing” effect caused by tissue loss, a nation
wide study has found.
The therapy may also help people with
cancer and other diseases gain weight.
AIDS patients averaged a gain of 3.6
pounds during the first three months of the
two-year study, and some eventually put on
30 pounds, said Dr. Morris Schambelan of
the University of California, San Francisco,
on Oct. 20.
“We had people who were severely wasted
and in wheelchairs,” he said. “But one guy,
by the summer, went up to Yellowstone and
climbed a small mountain.”
Unlike other weight gain therapies, use of
the bioengineered growth hormone increased
lean tissues such as muscles, organs and bone
mass, rather than fatty tissues, Schambelan
said.
The average increase in lean tissue was
6.6 pounds during the first three months be
cause many patients continued to lose some
fatty tissue.
Treadmill tests confirmed improved
muscle performance among the subjects, said
Schambelan, who coordinated the study from
San Francisco General Hospital.
“Having their legs being able to take them
further on a treadmill suggests growth hor
mone might help them get around day-to
day,” said Kathleen Mulligan, a UCSF endo
crinologist at San Francisco General Hospi
tal.
The improvement was so dramatic the ex
periment was interrupted and placebo patients
were given the growth hormone, which was
manufactured by Sereno Laboratories, Inc. of
Norwell, Mass.
The results follow previous successes in
treating burn and cancer patients with growth
hormones, said Jeffrey Laurence of Cornell
Medical Center. He also is a consultant with
the American Foundation for AIDS Research
in New York.
Problems with side effects have been mini
mal, although diabetics and people with high
blood pressure may not be able to take hor
mones.
Dr. Donald Kotler, an AIDS researcher at
St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center in New
York, said there is every reason to believe the
therapy would work with cancer, lung dis
ease or any illnesses that lead to wasting.
But Schambelan cautioned that cancer pa
tients often lose their appetites, and said food
is essential to make the growth hormone cre
ate tissue cells.
“This therapy is not going to work in
people who don’t eat—you don’t manufac
ture calories out of thin air,” he said.
Still unresolved is the question of whether
the therapy will prolong the life of AIDS or
cancer patients.
“The data are very promising, and the
FDA is reviewing the data with exactly that
question in mind,” Schambelan said.
The double blind experiment included 178
patients in hospitals and community treat- _
ment centers in several states. Results were
released at the Third International Sympo
sium on Nutrition and HIV-AIDS in Phila
delphia.
RICHARD COLE
Cambodia faces AIDS epidemic
Phnom Penh, Cambodia—Cambodia is
facing an AIDS epidemic that could become
worse than that in areas of neighboring Thai
land, a World Health Organization expert said
Oct. 18.
“This is my first visit to Cambodia, and it
is prompted by information that suggests an
epidemic has certainly reached Cambodia,”
Dr. Michael Merson, executive director of
WHO’s global AIDS program, told a news
conference.
He said 3.5 percent of Phnom Penh’s
blood donors are now testing positive for
HIV.
“Blood donors represent more or less the
general population and so can be used as an
idea of how much the epidemic is spreading
into the population,” he said. “That could
mean that 1 to 3 percent of the general popu
lation could be infected.”
In one of Thailand’s worst affected areas,
the northern province of Chiang Mai, 7 per
cent of blood donors have tested positive.
“The epidemic here isn’t as severe as in
northern Thailand, but it’s certainly moving
in that direction,” Merson said.
“We need to see this as a real potential
emergency,” he said, noting that the rapid
spread of HIV in Cambodia was similar to
what happened in northern Thailand.
Cambodia recorded its first HIV case in
1991, and to date 625 cases of HIV have been
diagnosed. In August, five infants under 2
months old tested HIV-positive after they were
brought to hospitals showing symptoms of
full-blown AIDS.
“My concern is that with the breakup of
families, with migration, with the poverty—
society is undergoing a lot of changes; it’s a
Dr. Michael Merson of WHO’s Global
Programme on AIDS.
perfect recipe for further spread of the epi
demic,” Merson said.
Nearly 40 percent of prostitutes surveyed
in the coastal resort town of Sihanoukville
earlier this year tested HIV-positive and it’s
now feared other provinces will show a simi
lar rate among commercial sex workers when
surveyed.
“Commercial sex workers don’t infect
themselves. They are infected by clients and
therefore many of the clients must be in
fected,” Merson said.
“It’s not too late to avoid a tragedy here
but action must be now at the highest levels,”
he said, appealing for a massive education
and condom distribution campaign.
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