On a more positive note, data collected from HIV patients in the Canadian province of British Columbia show that treatment with the combination anti-HIV drug therapy known as “highly active antiretroviral therapy” (HAART) has reduced the province’s HIV infection rate by half since 1996. Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse, said in a statement:
ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross is not surprised. “I think we all sort of knew that the more HIV patients get on HAART, the fewer transmissions will occur, but now we have evidence proving the efficacy of the therapy,” he says. “The mechanism seems clear: reduced viral load means reduced communicability. However, maybe giving patients a cocktail of drugs that requires taking several different pills three to eight times a day inspires patients to change their behavior as far as safe sex practices and intravenous drug use are concerned.”