1 1 MILLION HIV INFECTION IN CHILDREN PREVENTED

An estimated 1.1 million human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infections among children under the age of 15 have been prevented between 2005 and 2013.

According to data released by the UN Children`s Fund (UNICEF) Friday ahead of World AIDS Day, new HIV infections among children has declined by about 40 percent between 2009 and 2013, Xinhua reported.

However, the global goal of reducing the figure by 90 percent is still out of reach, the data said.

The progress has been made through providing more pregnant women living with HIV with services for the prevention of mother to child transmission (PMTCT), such as lifelong HIV treatment which can reduce the transmission of virus to babies and keep their mothers alive.

The sharpest declines took place in eight African countries, including Malawi, Ethiopia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, among others.

However, only 67 percent of pregnant women living with HIV in all low- and middle-income countries received the most effective treatment for PMTCT in 2013.

An estimated 190,000 children under the age of 15 died of AIDS-related causes in 2013 due to lack of treatment.

"If we can avert 1.1 million new HIV infections in children, we can protect every child from HIV but only if we reach every child," UNICEF Executive Director Anthony Lake said.

"We must close the gap, and invest more in reaching every mother, every newborn, every child and every adolescent with HIV prevention and treatment programmes that can save and improve their lives," Lake added.

HOMOEOPATHIC REMEDIES FOR URINARY TRACT INFECTION UTI

A urinary tract infection (UTI) is an infection in any part of your urinary system — your kidneys, ureters, bladder and urethra. Most infections involve the lower urinary tract — the bladder and the urethra.

Women are at greater risk of developing a UTI than men are. Infection limited to your bladder can be painful and annoying. However, serious consequences can occur if a UTI spreads to your kidneys.

Causes-- Urinary tract infections typically occur when bacteria enter the urinary tract through the urethra and begin to multiply in the bladder. Although the urinary system is designed to keep out such microscopic invaders, these defenses sometimes fail. When that happens, bacteria may take hold and grow into a full-blown infection in the urinary tract.

The most common UTIs occur mainly in women and affect the bladder and urethra.

·         Infection of the bladder (cystitis). This type of UTI is usually caused by Escherichia coli (E. coli), a type of bacteria commonly found in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract. However, sometimes other bacteria are responsible. Sexual intercourse may lead to cystitis, but you don't have to be sexually active to develop it. All women are at risk of cystitis because of their anatomy — specifically, the short distance from the urethra to the anus and the urethral opening to the bladder.

·         Infection of the urethra (urethritis). This type of UTI can occur when GI bacteria spread from the anus to the urethra. Also, because the female urethra is close to the vagina, sexually transmitted infections, such as herpes, gonorrhea, chlamydia and mycoplasma, can cause urethriti

Symptoms-- Urinary tract infections don't always cause signs and symptoms, but when they do they may include:

·         A strong, persistent urge to urinate

·         A burning sensation when urinating

·         Passing frequent, small amounts of urine

·         Urine that appears cloudy

·         Urine that appears red, bright pink or cola-colored — a sign of blood in the urine

·         Strong-smelling urine

·         Pelvic pain, in women — especially in the center of the pelvis and around the area of the pubic bone

HOMOEOPATHIC MEDICINES

CANTHARIS 30-Cantharis is one of the top remedies for UTI. This medicine can also be used in treating cases where there is recurrence, which means that people suffer from repeated attacks of these infections. It is indicated when the patient experiences a burning pain while passing urine. The patients get a feeling that they have to pass urine very often, but can pass very less urine at a time. Each time while passing urine, the patient experiences a very bad intense pain in the lower abdomen which extends upwards till the belly button. There is a feeling that the urine was not completely expelled and they feel that still more urine is yet to come out. The pain is more while walking and so the patients prefer to be in sitting posture just to avoid the unbearable pain. Another important symptom that indicates the use of Cantharis  is that there is pain in the back on both  sides of the spine. This region is very sensitive touch, hardly allows the patient to move. At times, the pain radiates down the urinary tract . The patient passes urine mixed with blood and sometimes they may pass frank blood. The urine is  turbid and full of fragments . The patient feels very restless and uneasy . They also have an itching sensation in the urethra after passing urine.

APIS MELLIFICA 30—Apis mel is another top remedy for UTI. There is frequent desire for urination or increase in the quantity of urine with burning/scalding/stinging pain and tenesmus during micturition.Urine is opaque and bloody.

MERC COR. 30--Merc Cor is another  effective remedy  for UTI.  This medicine can be thought of in cases where the patient  is unable to pass urine or has to put in a lot of effort  for the same. The urine is very little and most often the patient passes dark flesh like pieces of mucus in the urine. The urine is very hot and passes drop by drop and with great pain. Another feature of a Merc cor patient is that he/she experiences a lot  of sweating  immediately after passing urine. This usually happens because the patient has to strain a lot to pass urine.    This medicine can also be expected to give good results in recurrent UTIs in advanced stages of pregnancy.

SULPHUR 200-Sulphur is also an effective remedy for UTI.It is more suitable in chronic cases. The patient  has an unusual desire to pass urine at night. The patient passes large quantities of colorless urine. There is a sharp pain in the urethra while passing urine. At times the urine is loaded with thick sediments  with rose colored and bad smell.  The most characteristic symptom that indicates the use of Sulphur is the great burning sensation while passing urine. 

CLEMATIS ERECTA 30--Clemetis Erecta is very effective for UTI in patients who have suffered from Sexual transmitted disesaes . It is indicated when the symptoms are – Frequent scanty urine with burning at the orifice of urethra. The patient has an unusual desire to pass urine , urine is passed drop by drop , dribbling of urine even after passing of urine.

SARSPARILLA 30-Sarsaparilla is effective for UTI when the pain in the urethra is most marked when a person is almost done with passing urine. Along with this there is distension and tenderness over bladder. Urine is scanty, slimy and may contain sandy particles.

EQUISETUM Q—Equisetum is a near specific for UTI. There is frequent and intolerable urge to urinate.Dull pain in the bladder is constantly present.There is a shrap cutting burning sensation in the urethra when urinating.

PAREIRA BRAVA 3-Pareira brava is very effective for UTI. The leading symptoms are—constant urging to urinate , great straining . Pain down thighs during efforts to urinate. Urine is black, bloody with thick mucous. Urine is passed with great difficulty. In worst cases urine is passed only by going on hand and knees position.

COLI BACILLINUM 30-- Coli Bacillinum is a near specific medicine for treating e-coli infection. It helps in treating the recurrence of E coli Infection. There is pain and burning while urination.

UVA URSI 3X—Uva ursi is effective for UTI when the urine contains more blood and pus.Urine is slimy with thick ropy mucous and highly offensive.There is frequent urge to pass urine with a cutting burning pain in the  urethra .

YOUR VIRAL INFECTION HISTORY IN A SINGLE DROP OF BLOOD

New technology developed by Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) researchers makes it possible to test for current and past infections with any known human virus by analyzing a single drop of a person's blood. The method, called VirScan, is an efficient alternative to existing diagnostics that test for specific viruses one at a time.

With VirScan, scientists can run a single test to determine which viruses have infected an individual, rather than limiting their analysis to particular viruses. That unbiased approach could uncover unexpected factors affecting individual patients' health, and also expands opportunities to analyze and compare viral infections in large populations. The comprehensive analysis can be performed for about $25 per blood sample.

Stephen Elledge, an HHMI investigator at Brigham and Women's Hospital, led the development of VirScan. "We've developed a screening methodology to basically look back in time in people's [blood] sera and see what viruses they have experienced," he says. "Instead of testing for one individual virus at a time, which is labor intensive, we can assay all of these at once. It's one-stop shopping."

Elledge and his colleagues have already used VirScan to screen the blood of 569 people in the United States, South Africa, Thailand, and Peru. The scientists described the new technology and reported their findings in the June 5, 2015, issue of the journal Science.

VirScan works by screening the blood for antibodies against any of the 206 species of viruses known to infect humans. The immune system ramps up production of pathogen-specific antibodies when it encounters a virus for the first time, and it can continue to produce those antibodies for years or decades after it clears an infection. That means VirScan not only identifies viral infections that the immune system is actively fighting, but also provides a history of an individual's past infections.

To develop the new test, Elledge and his colleagues synthesized more than 93,000 short pieces of DNA encoding different segments of viral proteins. They introduced those pieces of DNA into bacteria-infecting viruses called bacteriophage. Each bacteriophage manufactured one of the protein segments -- known as a peptide -- and displayed the peptide on its surface. As a group, the bacteriophage displayed all of the protein sequences found in the more than 1,000 known strains of human viruses.

Antibodies in the blood find their viral targets by recognizing unique features known as epitopes that are embedded in proteins on the virus surface. To perform the VirScan analysis, all of the peptide-displaying bacteriophage are allowed to mingle with a blood sample. Antiviral antibodies in the blood find and bind to their target epitopes within the displayed peptides. The scientists then retrieve the antibodies and wash away everything except for the few bacteriophage that cling to them. By sequencing the DNA of those bacteriophage, they can identify which viral protein pieces were grabbed onto by antibodies in the blood sample. That tells the scientists which viruses a person's immune system has previously encountered, either through infection or through vaccination. Elledge estimates it would take about 2-3 days to process 100 samples, assuming sequencing is working optimally. He is optimistic the speed of the assay will increase with further development.

To test the method, the team used it to analyze blood samples from patients known to be infected with particular viruses, including HIV and hepatitis C. "It turns out that it works really well," Elledge says. "We were in the sensitivity range of 95 to 100 percent for those, and the specificity was good -- we didn't falsely identify people who were negative. That gave us confidence that we could detect other viruses, and when we did see them we would know they were real."

Elledge and his colleagues used VirScan to analyze the antibodies in 569 people from four countries, examining about 100 million potential antibody/epitope interactions. They found that on average, each person had antibodies to ten different species of viruses. As expected, antibodies against certain viruses were common among adults but not in children, suggesting that children had not yet been exposed to those viruses. Individuals residing South Africa, Peru, and Thailand, tended to have antibodies against more viruses than people in the United States. The researchers also found that people infected with HIV had antibodies against many more viruses than did people without HIV.

Elledge says the team was surprised to find that antibody responses against specific viruses were surprisingly similar between individuals, with different people's antibodies recognizing identical amino acids in the viral peptides. "In this paper alone we identified more antibody/peptide interactions to viral proteins than had been identified in the previous history of all viral exploration," he says. The surprising reproducibility of those interactions allowed the team to refine their analysis and improve the sensitivity of VirScan, and Elledge says the method will continue to improve as his team analyzes more samples. Their findings on viral epitopes may also have important implications for vaccine design.

Elledge says the approach his team has developed is not limited to antiviral antibodies. His own lab is also using it to look for antibodies that attack a body's own tissue in certain autoimmune diseases that are associated with cancer. A similar approach could also be used to screen for antibodies against other types of pathogens.