HIV and AIDS in the International Network of Instituts Pasteur
The establishments within the International Network of Instituts Pasteur (RIIP) are closely involved in the work on the AIDS virus and on the disease itself. The location of institutes in the Network, particularly in Africa and South-East Asia, is especially important knowing that more than 90% of AIDS cases are to be found in the South countries.
AIDS-tuberculosis co-infection in Cambodia
The Institut Pasteur in Cambodia is participating in an ANRS clinical trial. It is coordinated in the South by the "Cambodian Health Committee" and in the North by the Kremlin-Bicêtre hospital; it also involves the Institut Pasteur in Paris as well as an American team from Harvard Medical School. This trial aims to define the optimum moment for administering antiretrovirals in HIV+ patients with tuberculosis. This is a complex problem, since there are drug interactions between a key molecule in the anti tuberculosis treatment and certain antiretrovirals drugs, which often contraindicate concomitant use of the two treatments. In addition, the reconstitution of immunity obtained using antiretrovirals can be accompanied by a serious worsening of the tuberculosis, and the mechanisms of this are still not understood. Research on these immunological mechanisms, particularly the role of innate immunity, is being developed at the Institut Pasteur in Cambodia, in collaboration with a team from the Institut Pasteur in Paris. The results of this program will benefit the entire international medical community.
Preventing transmission from mother to child and improving the management of infected children in Cameroon
The Cameroon Pasteur Center, located in Yaoundé, was the initiator of a program for the therapeutic prevention of HIV/AIDS from mother to child, in collaboration with a team from the Institut Pasteur in Paris, and with the support of the Glaxo foundation. This program has resulted in the overall management of a program for prevention of mother-child transmission of the HIV-1 virus and care for pregnant women on a national level in Cameroon. The improvement in the management of infected children, in particular their treatment and response to vaccination, is the subject of an ANRS study, recently initiated in collaboration with the Parisian hospitals and teams from the Institut Pasteur in Paris.
These few examples are not exhaustive, as other research is being carried out within the International Network of Instituts Pasteur, such as the study of the genetic diversity of HIV-1 and its resistance to antiretrovirals (ARV) in naïve patients and patients undergoing treatment, as well as the assessment of inexpensive technologies for diagnosing newborn infants, and virological follow-up of patients in Africa, South-East Asia and Guiana.
In addition, in public health terms, the vast majority of Pasteur Institutes in the network in Africa and South-East Asia carry out serological and molecular diagnosis of HIV infection, and immunological follow-up (level of CD4+ T lymphocytes) and virological follow-up (viral load and resistance to ARV) of patients, whether or not they are being treated with ARVs.
