Researchers show V-1 Immunitor is good news for HIV patients

Business Day Editorial November 19, 2002

Recently, the world’s famous HIV research institute, Aventis Pasteur,
has raised the Thai food supplement V-1 Immunitor to Phase 3/4, a
stage that indicates it has shown to be the most effective cure
against Aids so far. The Thai HIV product has successfully undergone
Phase 3 safety and immunogenicity tests. It still needs to go through
Phase 4 – the final phase that proves its real effectiveness.

This is certainly a good news for the V-1 Immunitor inventor,
Pharmacist Vichai Jirathitikarn, and thousands of HIV patients all
over the country who are taking the drug (currently considered by the
Thai Food and Drug Administration as a mere food supplement). However
this good news has not been well recognized by the Thai Public Health
Ministry and other medical authorities.

Public Health Minister Sudarat Keyuraphan said last week the ministry
declined to include the V-1 Immunitor (under the medical name
"Absorbed Inactivated virion") in the government’s 30-baht universal
health care coverage scheme. She said the ministry would reconsider
only if and when V-1 could be scientifically proved as a valid
medicine.

The V-1 Immunitor made its debut last year when Pharmacist Vichai and
a former police deputy chief, Pol. Gen Salang Bunnag, started
distributing the V-1 Immunitor free of charge to interested HIV
patients. Vichai developed the V-1 Immunitor at his Ban Bangpakong
Clinic in Chasoengsao province, 80 kilometers east of Bangkok.

More patients kept coming to receive the drug after learning that many
HIV patients taking V-1 Immunitor have gained better health, with
their HIV status turning from positive to negative.

Unfortunately, four months ago doctors volunteering at the Salang
Bunnag Foundation accused Vichai of breaching an agreement that it be
distributed free of charge, and that the substance had failed to
improve immunity levels.

To these charges, Vichai replied that his clinic would not survive if
it continued to distribute the product free of charge. He also said
that people who took V-1 should stay under close supervision by
doctors – another reason why indiscriminate giveaways would not work.
He did admit that some patients who took V-1 had grown worse and died,
but said they all had had very low immunity levels which were hard to
reverse.

Vichai also pointed out that vested interests would stand to loose if
V-1 was a success. These vested interests include drug firms
distributing anti-antroviral drugs costing 20,000 -30,000 baht a
month. That’s why poor HIV patients died quickly – they could not
afford to buy such expensive medicines.

Vichai’s Ban Bangpakong Clinic sell V-1 at 60 baht per tablet to
people who can afford to pay, but support patients who cannot.

Apart from his patients who recovered from the HIV status, numerous
doctors have also supported him after their own individual studies of
different groups of HIV-infected patients taking V-1 Immunitor.

Oraphan Methadilokkul, an expert in occupational and environmental
medicine at Rajavithi Hospital, recently cited her finding from a
14-month follow-up study of 22 patients whose blood tests were
reported to have turn negative after they took V-1 from Ban Bangpakong
Clinic. She said it was still too soon to conclude that the food
supplement was an effective cure against HIV/Aids, and more studies
were needed.

With the recent listing of V-1 Immunitor by Adventis Pastuer as the
highest potential for curing this terrible disease, the Thai Public
Health Ministry and/or medical institutes should support extended
researches on this food supplement, for the sake of not only the Thai
patients, but also the HIV/Aids sufferers worldwide.