Thursday, January 31, 2013

Cocaine hampers HIV



      Just two studies presented at the conference were devoted to studying the effect of cocaine on HIV-positive patients. Rapporteur on both acted immunologist Joumana Zeidan of the Florida Institute for the development of vaccines and gene therapy. The objects of  first  studies were 18 HIV-infected patients with the same level of T-lymphocytes, each of whom regularly used cocaine. It was found that cocaine dramatically reduces the function of the thymus gland (thymus), which mature T cells, which play a key role in the immune response to the virus.

    The second study was conducted gene analysis showed that cocaine gives the signal connection between the incidence of virus cells and the thymus, resulting in the overproduction of regulatory T cells that suppress the immune response, at the expense of T-helper cells.

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