Major TREAT Asia Grant Extended Another Five Years

July 2011—A major research grant to support TREAT Asia's work in the Asia-Pacific has recently been renewed for a second five-year period by the US National Institutes of Health. As the regional representative of the International Epidemiology Databases to Evaluate AIDS (IeDEA) since 2006, TREAT Asia has been contributing data from its adult and pediatric observational cohorts to a global database that allows researchers to address key questions about antiretroviral therapy (ART) outcomes and how best to optimize treatment approaches. Funding for this grant is provided by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, and the National Cancer Institute.

"The TREAT Asia research funded by NIAID five years ago is one of very few studies providing information on the treatment and treatment outcomes of HIV-infected patients in an area that includes nearly two-thirds of the world's population," said Gerald B. Sharp, Dr.P.H., of NIAID's Division of AIDS. "These studies have shed light on the outcomes of HIV infection and ART, including lipodystrophy, anemia, viral suppression and treatment failure, HIV progression, and liver disease for patients with both HIV and hepatitis, which are highly prevalent infections in this region.

"TREAT Asia also has developed one of the most comprehensive cohorts for studying HIV-infected children and adolescents in Asia, providing information on treatment failure and second-line regimens as well as survival and disclosure of HIV status to pediatric patients," Dr. Sharp added. "We're particularly pleased that TREAT Asia plans to support new studies using large HIV databases in China in the renewal grant."