ISLAMABAD: A study has shown that the virus in over 10 per cent of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) patients in Pakistan develops resistance against medicines because either the patients discontinue treatment midway or get infected by an already drug-resistant virus.

The study also revealed that due to mutation the Pakistani virus had become different than the one in the United States and other countries. So it has been suggested that there is a need to carry out research on the virus at the Biological Safety Levels (BSL) III laboratory located at Shahzad Town, Islamabad.

The study, which had the sample size of 412 patients, was completed during the first PhD course of Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Medical University under the supervision of Pathology Department head Prof Hasan Abbas Zaheer. Prof Zaheer has already served as the manager of National Aids Control Programme for two years.

Dr Usman Waheed, who has conducted the study, told Dawn that there were many types of HIV. Moreover, as the process of mutation is very rapid it is not going to be easy to make vaccine against the virus, he said.

It says either patients discontinue treatment midway or get infected by an already drug-resistant virus

“It took almost six years to complete the study because the research was on ‘the molecular and genetic characterisation of HIV and its correlation with antiretroviral drug resistance among Aids patients’ which is very difficult. There are many types of viruses called sub-type or genotype but I was astonished to know that medicines are given in Pakistan without knowing what sub-type of virus is present in the patient’s body.”

He said polymerase chain reaction (PCR) should be done on every patient. Moreover, it should also be ascertained against which drug the virus has developed resistance.

Replying a question, Dr Waheed said it was worrying that over 10pc patients had drug resistant virus. He suggested that a database should be established to know which sub-type of virus was resistant against which drug and that particular drug should not be given to the patient.

“In a number of countries, including India, research is being done on the drug resistant virus and efforts are made to invent new medicines which would be effective against the drug resistant virus,” he said.

He regretted that there was a distance between researchers and the government due to which the latter did not support research work.

“The government should support universities but in ministries bureaucrats even try to avoid talking on such issues,” he said.

National Manager Aids Control Programme Dr Baseer Achakzai told Dawn that there was the issue of mutation with most of the viruses and bacteria due to which it becomes difficult to produce vaccine against them.

“We have also observed that people stop taking medicines midway due to which the virus develops an ability to resist drugs or first and second line drug becomes ineffective. In coming days, this can become a major problem in the country. Unfortunately, 90pc HIV patients are not literate so they cannot understand the problem,” he said.

Dr Achakzai said according to estimates there were over 165,000 HIV patients in Pakistan but majority of them were not registered.

Published in Dawn, February 19th, 2020