Some Anti-HIV drugs are related to premature aging
According to a research published in Nature Genetics, some anti-HIV drugs cause premature aging.
According to a study published in June 26 issue of Nature Genetics, a class of anti-HIV drugs cause an increase in mitochondrial aging resulting in premature aging of the individual. Mitochondria is the organelle of the cell that gives power to the cells. These findings are also clearing the fact that some individuals who take anti-HIV drugs show earlier signs of dementia and cardiovascular diseases particularly in the developing countries.
In order to find out the cause of these earlier signs in the people taking anti-HIV drugs, particularly Nucleoside analogue reverse-transcriptase inhibitors (NRTIs), researchers found that the mitochondria of the patients are damaged to some extent which happens normally in adult ages. Nucleoside analogue reverse-transcriptase inhibitors (NRTIs) — of which the most well known is Zidovudine, also known as AZT — were the first class of drug developed to treat HIV.
References and Further Reading:
Brendan, A. et. al. (2011). Mitochondrial aging is accelerated by anti-retroviral therapy through the clonal expansion of mtDNA mutations. Nature Genetics.
