Oh for heaven’s sake. You have gotta be a troll.

Did anyone else notice that his avatar changed? It was a picture of two guys in his first post and just one guy in his two subsequent posts.

I don’t want to get into a fight with you, Sir. So if that’s what happened, OK. I trust he is the subject of further study as his situation would appear to be unique.

At the same time, as some people here find Tx and waiting for SVR very stressful, nor do I think it is helpful to add to that by having them think their genotype may mutate into another genotype when the literature says it is not possible.

From HCV Advocate, first para of page2:

A blood test is required for the genotype test. Gener- ally, a quasispecies test is only performed for research purposes. HCV genotype testing is only done once since the genotype does not change unless someone is re-infected with a different genotype.

From the CDC about 3/4 of the way down under “Is it necessary to do viral geno typing when managing a person with chronic hepatitis c?”:

Once the genotype is identified, it need not be tested again; genotypes do not change during the course of infection.

As far as the accuracy of genotype testing, I haven’t been able to find anything. I know PCR tests can produce false positives/negatives and may be repeated and there is a lot of literature about that. But as I couldn’t find anything about genotype testing efficacy and as I can’t recall reading of a case where they got it wrong, I can only assume there is a high level of accuracy.

Thurl, I’m sorry if you failed to pick up the humour in my comment. I should have added a smiley. I just think that the world is not black and white. There is a lot of gray. There are good reasons for Prof Gane having links to Gilead. It does not automatically follow that he is the devil incarnate. In saying that some of the generics may not be bioequivalent, he is simply stating a fact it seems to me. This does not mean they aren’t bioequivalent or, even if they aren’t, they won’t work. Nor does it follow that he is arguing people should not take them. Indeed, other parts of the interview indicate otherwise.

I have always factored in the possibility of failure and, from the start, determined to keep hammering away from it. After all, with my level of fibrosis what else can I do? But in the meantime, I’m content that I’m giving it my best shot. I’m buoyed by the fact I still had enough get up and go left in me to hunt down the generics. And I’m proud I had the courage to take what I consider to be a well calculated leap of faith but a leap of faith nevertheless.

And I think everybody else is best off focusing on those things too and not the what ifs. If others feel differently, so be it. But personally, beyond having already decided to have another go in the case of relapse, I see no point worrying about crossing bridges that the science says I will probably never need to cross.

Don’t take this the wrong way but……sometimes when I read this forum I think people could be forgiven for thinking the DAAs cause certain individuals to LOSE THEIR FUCKING MINDS!

I’ll come to that in a moment. First to the question of using DAAs prophylactically. I asked this some months back here. You can read the doc’s response for yourself.

Now as to Professor Gane. The doc commented on that here. Please read it again. Here are some more of James’ comments about the Prof. I think some of you may have misinterpreted his response. Prof Gane, as far as we know, is not the enemy, is not being disingenuous, is not trying to scare the bejeezus out of everybody.

In the words of Tom Robbins, the enemy is dullness of mind.

This is like the whole Seymour thing all over again. And look at how well that ended. Lost ourselves one good source of information there.

My guess is no one’s tested to see if the Mesochem drugs are bioequivalent because that level of reverse engineering may not be possible. And in a post that I can’t find from the doc, IIRC he said it may not even matter if they are not exactly bioequivalent.

Bottom line, the Mesochem APIs might not work (my understanding is Incepta are just combining them to make Twinvir). In the same post I can’t find right now the doc points out there are good reasons to believe it will all be ok. Moreover, Mesochem is a big company and have a considerable reputation at stake. It would not be in their interests for this whole thing to go belly up.

Nevertheless, the drugs might not work. They might not work because they are not bioequivalent to the proprietary medications. They might not work because sometimes even the proprietary drugs don’t work. Here’s something to worry some more about if you feel you must. These drugs have been fast tracked. Nobody knows for sure yet what the long term effects may be.

As John Lennon said, “life’s what happens when you’re busy making other plans.”

Worrying is just gonna make you sick not better. And that’s dumb because there’s sweet FA that any of us can do about the situation beyond what we’ve already done.

Look good people, in all likelihood, you’re going to be cured. Really you are. But maybe you won’t be. You won’t know until you know. But please don’t waste your time fretting over something that hasn’t happened yet and that you can’t change even if it does. As far as relapsing goes, what I’ve been told is that if you hit it again harder, you almost certainly get it the second time around. So the odds of not being cured keep getting smaller. What’s more, if you said to me 10 years ago that within a decade we’d have drugs that would cure most cases of HCV, I’d of laughed in your face.

But here we are.

Likewise, as has already been pointed out, better and better drugs are on the horizon. But nothing in life is certain. Ever. In the meantime, all you can do is………

[video width=425 height=344 type=youtube]fZUmAbi0Vm4[/video]

Oh and in regard to this….

Blimey. Enkel, I know the man in question he was Geno type 4 Pre treatment
and post treatment he was Geno Type 3 his consultant same as mine explained it too me.

Geno type mutation is not unheard of!

I could be wrong, but I think it is unheard of. Mutations of genotype into a more resistant strain of the same genotype, yes. Mutation of one geno into another, I don’t think so. My bet would be this person has gotten reinfected with a different genotype.

Which is why I just ask to be able to block A.L’s posts personally.

Apparently, I’m supposed to be incredibly grateful to Gilead for buying and developing this drug. I don’t see it that way but s/he is entitled to their opinion. Thus far they haven’t come close to convincing me. As such, I couldn’t be bothered reading any more lectures about how great they are.

You don’t need a degree in advanced mathematics to see that the profits Gilead are making from these drugs is obscene. Hell if you take the lowest WHO figure for the number infected with HCV worldwide and multiply it by the cost in low income countries Gilead has done a deal with, the profit is still massive. Even allowing for development costs, manufacturing etc.

One of the problems with capitalism is that it fails to account for the common good even though if it did, capitalism would be in a better position to flourish.

As for the Australian government paying for Tx, we have socialised health care (mostly), a very non-capitalist idea. It ain’t exactly news. And Australians have shown repeatedly that politicians will be damned if they try to undermine it in any significant way. We vote them in and out, we pay their salaries, we pay the taxes. Paying for hep c txt is what I expect them to do because it is obviously the most sensible and economically viable course of action.

Just PMed you honker. I’m about 45 mins south of Hobart.

You Tx newbies are so cute. Look at ya all in a dither.

PS what does the duck mean?

And where’s my ranting banana? I’ve been trying to think of something to get cross about just so I could use the ranting banana but it’s not there.