AIDS ReSearch Alliance - Chairman's Message

Message From the Chairman of the Board

The outlook for people living with HIV infection could be viewed with continued relative optimism. Although the hyperbolic proclamations of the "end of AIDS" have long since faded, death rates remain comparatively low in the U.S. as compared to several years ago. There are now 14 anti-HIV drugs approved for use by the FDA. AIDS Research Alliance is proud to have participated in the clinical research that contributed to the approval of several of these new drugs. Many individuals who initiated cocktail anti-HIV treatment continue to fare well—some in far better health than 3 years ago. The successes that have been gained in HIV treatment are in themselves testimonials to the tangible results that can be expected from dedicated biomedical research.

However, the downside of current therapeutic options have become apparent as well: cocktail anti-HIV therapy quite often fails to meet the goal of maintaining undetectable viral loads, and the toxic side effects of the drugs now often replace AIDS-related conditions in reducing the quality of life of infected individuals. Furthermore, people living with HIV face the troubling reality that even when their virus is well-suppressed by therapy, the virus remains ever-present in their immune cells, and could eventually become resistant to treatment. Already there are many with few or no remaining treatment options. Even worse, the vast majority of the world's HIV-infected population will never be able to afford these cocktail anti-HIV treatments at all.

Given the now universal recognition that current treatments simply fail to cure the infection, it behooves us not just to improve cocktail therapy, but to also develop novel therapeutic approaches. While current research findings suggest what these news approaches might be, we can state definitively what the goal must be—the long-term survival of as many HIV-infected people as possible, with the least detrimental effects on their quality of life.

New and better hope for those living with HIV will come from continuing the fervent pace of research into HIV/AIDS. We at AIDS Research Alliance will strive towards improving the treatment of HIV infection, until the day that a cure is found. In continued partnership for the cure,

Cam Davis
Chairman, Board of Directors

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