                     AIDS Daily Summary 
                      April 19, 1996
     
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) National 
AIDS Clearinghouse makes available the following information as a 
public service only. Providing this information does not 
constitute endorsement by the CDC, the CDC National AIDS 
Clearinghouse, or any other organization. Reproduction of this 
text is encouraged; however, copies may not be sold, and the CDC 
National AIDS Clearinghouse should be cited as the source of this 
information. Copyright 1996, Information, Inc., Bethesda, MD
     
     
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"Drug Firms to Offer Settlement to AIDS-Infected Hemophiliacs" 
"District's AIDS Rate Again Tops the Nation"
"Maker of an AIDS Vaccine Says Test Found No Benefit" 
"Patients Desperate for AIDS Drug"
"Across the Nation: New Hampshire"
"Beijing Finds 122 People HIV-Positive Since 1985" 
"More Condom Promotion Needed Among Heterosexuals" 
"Tearful Filipino Pleads for Ebola Monkeys"
"Animal Model Found for Slowly Progressive Tuberculosis" 
"AIDS Scandal Old News to TV Anchor" 
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"Drug Firms to Offer Settlement to AIDS-Infected Hemophiliacs" 
Washington Post (04/19/96) P. A2
     After five months of negotiations, four drug companies
accused of selling HIV-infected blood to thousands of U.S. 
hemophiliacs have agreed to offer a $600 million settlement today 
to end a decade of litigation.  If accepted, the settlement would 
compensate every American hemophiliac who contracted HIV from 
tainted blood products sold by the companies during the 1980s. 
Families of deceased patients and spouses or children who were 
infected would also be covered.  The companies, which are not 
admitting legal responsibility or wrongdoing, are Bayer, Baxter 
International, Rhone-Poulenc Rorer, and Alpha Therapeutics. 
Related Stories: Wall Street Journal (04/19) P. B6; Baltimore Sun 
(04/19) P. 4A; USA Today (04/19) P. 1A
     
"District's AIDS Rate Again Tops the Nation" 
Washington Times (04/19/96) P. A3;  Sheets, Gary
     Washington, D.C., again has the nation's highest AIDS rate,
far higher than even New York and San Francisco, according to 
statistics released Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control 
and Prevention (CDC).  The 1995 D.C. rate of 185.7 AIDS cases per 
100,000 residents dropped from 246.9 per 100,000 in 1994 but was 
still almost half again as high as the nearest city's.  Puerto 
Rico was second with a rate of 70.3 cases per 100,000, followed 
by New York, Florida, and New Jersey.  Nationwide, the rate of 
AIDS cases is 27.8 cases per 100,000 people, down from 30.2 in 
1994.  The CDC said that AIDS is spreading more among women and 
minorities now, while the epidemic among homosexual white men has 
slowed.  Women accounted for 19 percent of all AIDS cases among 
adults and adolescents nationwide in 1995, their highest 
proportion ever.  Blacks were six times more likely to have AIDS 
than whites and twice as likely to have AIDS as Hispanics.  
Related Story: Baltimore Sun (04/19) P. 5B
     
"Maker of an AIDS Vaccine Says Test Found No Benefit" 
New York Times (04/19/96) P. A18;  Kolata, Gina
     Research on an AIDS vaccine designed to bolster the immune
system of people already infected with HIV has ended, proving the 
vaccine ineffective.  Researchers at the Walter Reed Army 
Institute of Medical Research and the National Institute of 
Allergy and Infectious Diseases report that they did not find 
evidence that Microgenesys' Gp-160 vaccine benefited the 304 
people who received it.  Robert Sherrer, president of 
Microgenesys, said the company was conducting other studies but 
that "this one was pivotal."  Federal funding for a larger study 
of Gp-160 was denied several years ago, on the grounds that 
results were needed from the study just completed.  When a $20 
million appropriation for the study was then included in the 
Defense Department budget, a dispute among researchers erupted.  
The money was later transferred to the National Institutes of 
Health to be used for general vaccine research.  John Moore, an 
AIDS researcher at the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center in New 
York, said the results should deter companies from pushing ahead 
too fast.  Related Story: Financial Times (04/19) P. 7
     
"Patients Desperate for AIDS Drug"
Toronto Globe and Mail (04/18/96) P. A10;  Immen, Wallace
     Canadian AIDS patients are desperate for two expensive new 
protease inhibitors not yet available in Canada but being bought 
by Canadians in the United States.  Although the protease 
inhibitor saquinavir has been approved in Canada, it is not 
considered as powerful as ritonavir or indinavir, which were both 
approved in the United States in March.  The drugs are expected 
to be available in Canada this summer.  Approval of new 
drugs--and their resulting distribution--is slower in Canada 
because the drug companies apply for U.S. approval first.  AIDS 
drugs receive priority, however, and those thought to offer 
significant benefit are reviewed in 180 days rather than the 
usual 360 days.
     
"Across the Nation: New Hampshire"
USA Today (04/19/96) P. 11A
     New Hampshire resident Mark Brousseau, who has HIV, says he
has no plans to close his Newmarket health food store, despite an 
unsigned letter of protest sent to City Hall complaining of 
Brousseau's HIV-positive status.  The letter threatened "If you 
don't ... stop him, some of us will."
     
"Beijing Finds 122 People HIV-Positive Since 1985" 
Reuters (04/18/96)
     A total of 122 people in Beijing have tested positive for
HIV since 1985.  Of that total, 51 were foreigners, 41 were 
non-Beijing residents, and 30 were local people.  The first cases 
of HIV in people native to Beijing were reported in 1989.  Twelve 
of the 30 locals have developed AIDS and seven have died.  China 
has some 50,000 to 100,000 HIV-positive individuals, with more 
than 70 percent living in the southwestern Yunnan province, an 
area of high drug use.
     
"More Condom Promotion Needed Among Heterosexuals" 
Reuters (04/18/96)
     Between 1990 and 1992, there were no decreases in the number
of heterosexual adults who had multiple sex partners, high-risk 
partners, or who were tested for HIV, researchers report in the 
American Journal of Public Health.  A consistent increase in 
condom use was limited to people with risk factors for HIV.  
Kyung-Hee Choi and Joseph A. Catania of the University of 
California at San Francisco suggest that, based on these 
findings, broader condom promotion is needed.
     
"Tearful Filipino Pleads for Ebola Monkeys" 
Reuters (04/18/96);  Alabastro, Ruben
     A Philippine breeder conceded on Thursday that his monkeys
were probably responsible for the Ebola scare at a Texas primate 
research center, but pleaded to save them from death.  On 
Wednesday, U.S. health workers began killing 48 monkeys that may 
have been exposed to a strain of the Ebola virus.  Alex Lina, 
owner of Fertile Scientific Research, said all 800 monkeys on his 
farm were killed in 1989 after an outbreak of the Ebola Reston 
strain.  Fertile supplies researchers in the United States and 
Europe and last November shipped 40 monkeys to Sweden for AIDS 
research.  In Manila, the government is working to prevent any 
public alarm over the current U.S. outbreak, assuring people that 
the virus strain is not harmful to humans.  A team from the U.S. 
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected in Manila 
next week to help inspect monkey breeding farms.
     
"Animal Model Found for Slowly Progressive Tuberculosis" 
Lancet (04/13/96) Vol. 347, No. 9007, P. 1031;  Fricker, Janet
     Slowly progressive tuberculosis (TB), the type most common
in humans, can be induced in cynomolgus monkeys, Marcus Horwitz 
and colleagues at the University of California, Los Angeles have 
discovered.  Rhesus monkeys, the only established non-human 
primate model for studying TB, almost always develop an acute, 
fulminant, highly fatal form of TB, even when given small doses. 
The researchers gave Philippine cynomolgus monkeys Mycobacterium 
tuberculosis intratracheally and found that the degree of 
infection depended on the dose.  The monkeys receiving the 
highest doses developed an acute, rapidly progressive, highly 
fatal, multilobar pneumonia, compared to the chronic, slowly 
progressive, localized form of pulmonary TB in the monkeys given 
lower doses.  Ninety percent of humans infected with M. 
tuberculosis do not develop overt disease, so these monkeys 
provide a critical study group to determine how the organisms 
survive in a dormant state in a primate host.
     
"AIDS Scandal Old News to TV Anchor"
Nikkei Weekly (04/08/96) Vol. 34, No. 1717, P. 21
     Yoshiko Sakurai, a writer and long-time anchor for the
midnight news show on Japan's Nippon Television Network, wrote a 
book two years ago exposing the country's tainted blood scandal. 
In "AIDS Crimes: The Tragedy of Hemophiliacs," Sakurai revealed 
the poor response of health officials and drug firms to the 
dangers of HIV infection from contaminated blood.  The book, 
which won the author Japan's most prestigious prize for 
nonfiction, came nearly two years before the Ministry of Health 
and Welfare and five drug companies disclosed their roles in the 
distribution of risky blood products.
     
     
