| Health Minister Kamran Baqeri Lankarani on Saturday announced that Iran’s scientists have produced a herbal medicine that boosts the human immunity system against the HIV/AIDS virus. “The herbal-based medication, called IMOD, serves to control the AIDS virus and increases the body’s immunity,” Baqeri Lankarani was quoted as saying by the official news agency IRNA. “It is not a medication to kill the virus, it rather can be used besides other anti-retroviral drugs,” Baqeri Lankarani said on state radio. The drug, made after five years of research, has been tested on 200 patients, IRNA said, adding that it is considered the fifth generation of medications helping control the HIV/AIDS virus. “This is a substance good for both AIDS patients and those who carry the virus without showing the symptoms,” the director of the project, Muhammad Farhadi, told state television. Farhadi said the medication would now be tested on some 3,000 to 5,000 Iranian patients in the next year to monitor its efficacy. Health Minister Baqeri Lankarani said that the number of HIV/AIDS cases in Iran stands at around 14,000 while 1,700 people have died of the disease. Last June, Iranian officials warned about the rapid spread of HIV/AIDS infections in the country. |