Some HIV/AIDS Patients Have Hepatitis B Infection-Prof. Perno

 

 Leocadia Bongben

Federico Carlo Perno, Professor of Virology at the University of Rome ‘Tor Vergata, has said counting by the Chantal Biya International Research Centre For HIV/AIDS Prevention and Treatment, CIRCB, reveals that about 10 per cent of patients with HIV/AIDS have Hepatitis B Infection.

Prof. Perno spoke to the press while coordinating the first CIRCB Scientific Council Meeting presided at by Jean Stephane Biatcha, President of CIRCB Management Board.

The Scientific Council is a consultative organ that approves programmes, defines axis and evaluates research activities of the centre.

“Though called Hepatitis B infection, this is a sexually transmitted disease. It is a virus transmitted through sex, which goes vertically to children, and horizontally to partners”, Perno says.  

He expressed fears that an increase in this infection in future might create major problems for the liver.

However, he said there is well known Hepatitis B vaccine developed in the past 20 years, a vaccine that works.

In this vein, one of the endeavours of CIRCB, he said could be to demonstrate that this is effective and could be distributed to the population.

Against this backdrop, Perno has identified Hepatitis B as a problem in Africa and Cameroon.

He stressed on the need to deal with it Hepatitis B in future stating that with the increase of HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis B could certainly increase.

Besides, he also identified the papilloma virus-cancer driven by virus as another problem.

With the problem of Hepatitis B and Cancer driven virus, Perno expresses the hope that CIRCB “becomes a centre of reference for many diseases driven by viruses, which affect the population in Cameroon”.

Focusing on HIV/AIDS presently, there is hope for CIRCB to do a lot in vaccine for HIV/AIDS which is a problem everywhere. “Cameroon being the Centre of epidemics, there is a possibility of studying viruses which elsewhere are impossible to see” says Perno.

He painted a brighter future for the centre with the possibility that ‘something’ for HIV/AIDS vaccine comes from CIRCB.

Improving the quality of therapy for patients in Cameroon is achievable in collaboration with the hospitals around, he averred.

Perno’s hopes are in line with the research presently carried out by Dr. Godwin Nchinda head of Immunology Laboratory to get a vaccine that can be used for infected persons to improve their immune system.

Vaccine research at CIRCB is at the pre-clinical stage – “this is simply using samples from patients who are treatment naïve- those infected but are not taking any treatment to check their immune system to see whether they have some degree of protection from the virus”, Dr. Nchinda says.

The President of the Management Committee, Jean Stephane Biatcha traced the origin of the centre to 2006 created with the collaboration of the Italian government.

Thanks to the scientific foundation laid by Prof. Luc Montangier, Prof. Peter Ndoumbe, and Prof. Victorio Coulizzi the centre has gradually moved to its present Level.

On 31 May CIRCB was transformed to a public establishment with a particular status under the Ministry of Public Health.