[afro-nets] Food a basic need in HIV fight, U.N. agency says

["Claudio Schuftan" <claudio@hcmc.netnam.vn>]

Food a basic need in HIV fight, U.N. agency says
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http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N164866.htm

Food a basic need in HIV fight, U.N. agency says

16 Aug 2006 20:59:00 GMT
Source: Reuters

By Natalie Armstrong

TORONTO, Aug 16 (Reuters) - Drugs are no good without food in the fight against HIV/AIDS in Africa, Asia and Latin America, and the essential role  of proper nutrition has been forgotten, the United Nations World Food Program said on Wednesday.

Organizers of the 16th International AIDS Conference marked a small victory with the announcement that more than 1.6 million people globally now receive lifesaving HIV drugs.

But without proper food, victims of the disease have little will to live, the World Food Program said.

"In a study we did in rural Haiti, we found most of our patients with HIV disease spent more than half of all their time and other resources looking for food," said Dr. Paul Farmer, a professor at Harvard Medical School who has worked in Haiti since the AIDS epidemic started 25 years ago.

Farmer, who is also co-founder of Partners in Health, a nonprofit organization, said, "We don't know how to treat this advanced disease without food." Some drugs also need to be taken on a full stomach, or be soon followed by food, he added.

The World Food Program, which provides food assistance to 21 of 25 nations with the highest HIV prevalence rates, and the United Nations AIDS agency UNAIDS say that between 3.8 million and 6.4 million people need nutritional support from 2006 to 2008, at a cost of $1.1 billion.

It costs 66 cents a day to provide nutritious food to an AIDS patient and his or her family, the groups said. 

--
Claudio Schuftan
mailto:<claudio@hcmc.netnam.vn