LEADING UP to the Christmas holidays, the HIV/AIDS Mailbox shared with Persons Living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV) eating tips they should observe, particularly during the festive season.

The information given was intended to offer guidance to PLHIV in the choice of foods which would contribute to improved health, and at the same time caution them against consuming foods which would impair their health.

Whilst some people may have heeded the advice given, certainly others did not, which can only redound to their detriment.

During the holidays, I recall chatting with a young woman who is Living with HIV, whose medication has been doing well for her, and who certainly enjoys a look of wellness.

I was devastated, however, when she delightfully commented on her alarming intake of pepper-pot during the season, adding that she enjoys it best when pork is added and pressured cooked until mellow. That, for her, was a great relish.

Let me repeat the warning given a few weeks ago on the use of pepper-pot by Persons Living with HIV/AIDS:

“Pepperpot, ginger-beer: For persons with early infection, use pepperpot in moderation, and for middle and late-stage infection, avoid using these altogether, since both tend to result in frequent bowel movement. There is also evidence that the use of too much cassava casareep causes some persons to get diarrhea.

Some PLWHA, depending on their disease’s progression, might have been advised by their doctors not to use red meats such as the meat we use in pepperpot. This is because red meats have high fat levels, and eating this may increase the level of fat in your blood stream, and by extension the risk of heart disease.”

The International AIDS Society, in an article authored by Mark Mascolini, on Wednesday broke the news that “people with HIV have tripled death risk regardless of heart disease.”

Alluding to the findings of Researchers from the Study of Fat Redistribution and Metabolic Change in HIV infection (FRAM), Mascolini was saying: “In the United States, people with HIV infection have more than a three-time higher risk of death than people of the same age without HIV, regardless of cardiovascular and demographic factors that affect the risk of death.” He looked at a study, which compared 469 HIV-infected adults with 280 age-matched controls to determine their relative risk of death from 2004 to 2007, and added that statistical analysis to calculate death risk factored in demographic and cardiovascular variables.

Another health risk highlighted in the study is cigarette smoking. “Looking only at the HIV- positive group,” Mascolini said, “the researchers calculated that current smokers had almost a tripled risk of death compared with people who never smoked.”

Given that PLHIV naturally have more than a three-time higher risk of death than people of the same age without HIV, what would one expect of the PLHIV on therapy who engages in the uncontrolled use of fatty foods? There is need for even more caution, in the light of the fact that effective anti-retroviral therapy (ART) has been known to cause PLHIV to experience fat accumulation in certain parts of the body.

In another article, titled ‘Body Fat Changes in People With HIV’ and carried in a publication, ‘The Body’, Todd Brown, MD, of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, comments on the visible changes seen in the body composition of persons on effective HIV therapy.

“I think in general,” said Brown, “that patients who begin antiretroviral therapy see a lot of good things happening. They see their weight increasing, their body circumference increasing. That’s usually in a time frame of about six months to a year, I’d say.”

He observed that when people with HIV infection start on effective HIV therapy, they begin to develop trunk fat. Areas such as “their arms, legs, and waist” begin to accumulate fat, he said, adding that those are the areas researchers have been concentrating on in their studies.

Dr. Brown also presented the scenario in which studies look at [treatment-]naive patients beginning antiretrovirals, and who are also taking thymidine analogs. “You find a decrease in the peripheral circumferences, peripheral measurements of body circumference. So you see decreases in arm circumferences, decrease in limb fat by DEXA,” he noted.

We wish to assure you that we at the Guyana Chronicle are very much concerned about your health and wellbeing, and urge you to keep reading as we continue to bring you useful information through our HIV/AIDS Mailbox.
Our address is: HIV/AIDS Mailbox, Guyana Chronicle, Lama Avenue, Bel Air Park, Georgetown)