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US’s Centres for Disease Control recommends new type of HIV testing

The [b]US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)[/b] is recommending a new type of HIV testing that utilises diagnostics that can detect infection up to three to four weeks faster, potentially preventing the spread of the Aids virus, reports [s]Reuters Health[/s]. Nearly 1 in 6 people living with HIV in the US do not know they have the virus, according to the CDC. That means they may unknowingly transmit the virus as well as be delaying treatment for themselves. Speedier diagnosis is critical since many new infections are transmitted by people in the earliest stage of infection, the CDC said.

Meanwhile data shows that while few patients treated at US emergency departments have HIV, those who do test positive for the virus are in the most infectious stage or have already developed Aids. ‘Our results show that many people continue to be infected without being aware of it,’ said study author Dr Kara Iskyan Geren, of [b]Maricopa Integrated Health System[/b] in [b]Phoenix[/b] in [s]Medicinenet[/s]. Researchers looked at data from nearly 22,500 ER patients who were tested for HIV. Of those, only 0.28% of patients were found to have the Aids-causing virus. Of those who tested positive, 23% had acute HIV infections (most infectious stage) and 28% had progressed to Aids.

[link url=http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/06/26/us-cdc-hiv-idUSKBN0F12IF20140626]Full Reuters Health report[/link]
[link url=http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=179220]Full Medicinenet report[/link]
[link url=http://www.annemergmed.com/article/S0196-0644(14)00426-0/abstract]Annals of Emergency Medicine abstract[/link]

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