Nigeria Aids Agency Warns Against The Claim For HIV Cure

Professor of Veterinary Medicine and Clinical Virology at the Michael Okpara University of Agriculture in Umuahia, Aba State, Professor Maduike Ezeibe, had claimed earlier that he had produced a drug that could cure HIV, which he said was produced with "Aluminium Magnesium Silicate" and had been successfully tested on ten persons living with HIV. However, The Director General of the National Agency for the Control of AIDS, Sani Aliyu, has expressed displeasure with the publicity given to the claim of a cure for HIV/AIDS by the Nigerian professor, saying that it was a great disservice to the vulnerable group of HIV patients for the media to disseminate such claims in the absence of scientific evidence. The Minister of Health, Isaac Adewole, on Monday disclosed that the Federal Government had mandated the National Institute for Medical Research and the College of Medicine, Ibadan to do a proper study of claims of HIV cure in the country. Mr. Adewole pointed out that getting a cure would be of public health interest to the country but that any claim would have to be subjected to standard scrutiny. He stated this in a meeting in Ilorin, Kwara State, while responding to questions on the position of government on the claims "We are concerned that the publicity given to these claims will stop patients with HIV from taking life-saving antiretrovirals and give them false hope of a cure," the NACA Director General said on the claim in the statement on Monday. Mr. Aliyu then calls on academics to follow legal and scientifically-acceptable methods in conducting their researches and to avoid making premature claims that are capable of derailing the huge progress made in the last two decades in the war against HIV/AIDS. He noted that millions of lives have been saved as a result of modern antiretroviral treatment and people living with HIV can now look forward to a normal healthy future, and encourages people living with HIV to continue to take their medication and to see their doctors if they have any concern or call the NACA helpline (6222) for information. Source: All Africa News