Oh, I'm sure there are a lot of people who are still dying. Not everyone has access to these drugs, not everyone will take the drugs and some people still do have severe side effects that make it impossible to take the drugs. Hopefully, we will be able to make these meds accessible to anyone who needs them.

It's also worth pointing out that different people react differently to the same drugs. You may respond very well and have no problems from the HIV while on retrovirals, while I could show no improvement.

That's very unlikely, however. The vast majority of patients who take these drugs control their HIV viral loads very well.

While the drugs may overall tend to be very effective, any drug can be a degree of effectiveness based on the patient. Some drug therapies are obviously more pronounced in this effect (steroids for sarcoidosis comes to mind), but it still happens with all drugs. Specifically with AIDS, because many patients take it for such a long time, the virus can develop resistances to the therapies and become significantly less effective.

While, modern medicine has made great strides especially over the ~20 years of HAART, HIV/AIDS patients do die over time, albeit, at later ages they normally would and possibly something unrelated to their infection... Please let me know if I am wrong...

It is my understanding that they die from total organ failure, at one time. HAART does cause a lipoatrophy as well as left ventricular cardiomyopathy. So that's rough 2-3 vital organs involved: pancreas, heart and liver (and/or kidney).

While we do not see that many people dying from a painful death from full-blown AIDS symptoms, such as the Kaposi's Sarcoma or the Pneumocystis carnii, at rates seen in the mid-1980's, these souls actually do die from shorten lifespan with chronic diseases of cardiovascular aging. And very few odd cancers, like astroglialomas or hepatocarcinomas that normally happens in rodents...

While that does not negate the treatment with HAARTs and they are beneficial for treatments, there does have to be disclosure with these drugs, they are NOT aspirins or Tylenols--they are multi-functional pharmas, protease inhibitors, anti-retrovirucides, etc...

Most lay people really do not get that fact, making it a PART of a public health issue rather than a physician ONLY issue...

How do I know as a former R21 NIH awarded research scientist, hospice caregiving is NOT a joke...

Just trying to help...

The causes of death in HIV/AIDS has evolved over time significantly. Lifespan after diagnosis can be many decades now. I agree that these drugs are not totally benign drugs. Lipoatrophy, pancreatitis are common side effects, though the newer drugs are less likely to cause these side effects. One of the major problems with the earlier drugs has been improved with the newer drugs...fewer pills fewer times a day. This also decreases the likelihood of multidrug resistance since patients are less likely to miss their doses. Sure there are still problems, but therapy is fairly benign for the average patient. This allows the patients to live normal lives. Jumping to stem cell transplants, however, will result in costly and deadly results.
Hopefully with more time, researchers will continue to find drugs that suppress the virus with even fewer side effects. All in all, there have been great leaps in treatment since the 80s.

I agree with you, but before these therapies, patients didn't live long enough for that to happen. It's hard to fault a drug that gives the patient so many extra years to actually develop a resistance. Yes, drugs have varying levels of effectiveness depending on the specific genetics of the patient and virus, but all in all, the drugs are VERY effective.

Thank you for your explanation.

Laypeople do think that by the time they get "normal" CD4+ counts, and low HIV titers, they are as healthy as an "ox" like a normal person. The reality is, that is how the "cocktails" keep you safe from degenerating with all kinds of crazy diseases that once predominated when we did not have the HAART...

The patients live probably up until their 60's. Maybe there are some longitudinal studies, I haven't seen them, myself. It doesn't mean they don't exist, but it would be nice to know the efficacy of the HAART longitudinally.

I agree, we need to "slow our roll" on stem transplant if there is true correction against HIV. Something tells me the data need more interrogation... Especially in light of quite a bit of scientific misconduct that is going on these days. I would wait to see correction in primates before I recommend a human trial...

That's just my opinion... Feel free to take it or leave it.