kebaldwin
Sat, Feb-24-07, 09:02
Herbal drugs fail to cure AIDS in Zambia trials
Fri Feb 23, 3:50 PM ET
Zambia's government announced Friday that widely publicized herbal drugs held to cure AIDS have been proved ineffective after clinical trials conducted on dozens of HIV patients.
Health Minister Angela Cifire said the six-month trial conducted on 26 HIV-positive volunteers showed that the traditional herbs could prolong the lives of sufferers but fell short of a much anticipated cure.
"The herbal medicines that were under study do not cure HIV infection," Cifire said in a statement.
She said the herbalists claimed that the drugs could cure AIDS within a period of three months but experts decided to give it a longer period, which still failed to yield positive results.
Out of 79 herbs presented for research by traditional health practitioners, only three qualified to undergo a thorough clinical trial, Cifire said.
"None of the 26 participants died and no side effects were observed," she said.
But the herbalists have insisted that they can cure AIDS and asked for the trials to be continued with a bigger sample of patients.
"The sample was too small and the period was also no longer enough for effective monitoring of patients," said Rodwell Vongo, chairman of the Traditional Health Practitioners of Zambia.
The government spent 1.4 billion kwacha (about 340,000 dollars) on the trial.
Zambia, which has a population of about 11 million, has a HIV prevalence rate of 16 percent and the government is only providing free anti-retroviral drugs to 75,000 people.
Gambian President Yahya Jammeh has recently come under fire for claiming that he can cure AIDS within a matter of days by administering special herbs.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070223/hl_afp/zambiaaidsresearch&printer=1;_ylt=Ajmq8X5D9MDBOwQtmdGFpQ.KOrgF
Fri Feb 23, 3:50 PM ET
Zambia's government announced Friday that widely publicized herbal drugs held to cure AIDS have been proved ineffective after clinical trials conducted on dozens of HIV patients.
Health Minister Angela Cifire said the six-month trial conducted on 26 HIV-positive volunteers showed that the traditional herbs could prolong the lives of sufferers but fell short of a much anticipated cure.
"The herbal medicines that were under study do not cure HIV infection," Cifire said in a statement.
She said the herbalists claimed that the drugs could cure AIDS within a period of three months but experts decided to give it a longer period, which still failed to yield positive results.
Out of 79 herbs presented for research by traditional health practitioners, only three qualified to undergo a thorough clinical trial, Cifire said.
"None of the 26 participants died and no side effects were observed," she said.
But the herbalists have insisted that they can cure AIDS and asked for the trials to be continued with a bigger sample of patients.
"The sample was too small and the period was also no longer enough for effective monitoring of patients," said Rodwell Vongo, chairman of the Traditional Health Practitioners of Zambia.
The government spent 1.4 billion kwacha (about 340,000 dollars) on the trial.
Zambia, which has a population of about 11 million, has a HIV prevalence rate of 16 percent and the government is only providing free anti-retroviral drugs to 75,000 people.
Gambian President Yahya Jammeh has recently come under fire for claiming that he can cure AIDS within a matter of days by administering special herbs.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070223/hl_afp/zambiaaidsresearch&printer=1;_ylt=Ajmq8X5D9MDBOwQtmdGFpQ.KOrgF