Estimated worldwide HIV infections: 53 640 776 at 4.15pm on Wednesday September 10 2003.
Women who are overweight experience slower HIV progression and have higher CD4 cell counts than women who are underweight, according to research published in the September 1 edition of Clinical Infectious Diseases.
Investigators involved in the HIV Epidemiology Research study recruited 799 HIV-positive women to establish if there was an association between body mass index (BMI) and several clinically important HIV disease outcomes.
Investigators established that a higher baseline BMI was associated with a delay in the time taken for the CD4 cell count to fall below 200. Odds ratios also indicated that women with higher BMI were less likely to experience HIV-related events, ‘whether clinical, immunological or mortality relatedâ€.
The odds of death in women who were underweight were 3,1 times greater than in obese women.
Source: Aidsmap.com