WESTWOOD—On Monday, November 30, UCLA announced that the National Institutes of Health awarded the UCLA branch of the International Maternal Pediatric Adolescent AIDS Clinical Trials Network, known as IMPAACT, $25 million in funding for HIV research for children and women.
The funding will help enable researchers to work with the center’s statistical and data management center, as well as at the network operation center. The center has already led to effective therapeutic options for children, women, and adolescents living with HIV and influenced the standard care.
The IMPAACT Network is made up of investigators, institutions, and others that assess therapeutic options for HIV and symptoms associated with the virus that strike pregnant women, adolescents, children, and infants. IMPAACT also analyzes clinical trials that address therapy options for mother-to-child transmission of HIV.
“I am honored to contribute to IMPAACT’s efforts to provide pregnant women, infants, children and adolescents with state-of-the-art HIV therapies. I hope we will be able to cure children and adolescents of HIV in the near future,” said Chief of Infectious Diseases at UCLA Mattel Children’s Hospital, Dr. Grace Aldrovandi in a statement.
Researchers will work towards developing new tests and coordinate laboratory options that include evaluation, management, training, and educational programs.
The UCLA IMPAACT Laboratory Center’s mission is to provide the support that helps researchers develop HIV treatments as well as strategies leading to AIDS remissions without antiretroviral therapies. The center’s mission also hopes to advance treatments for tuberculosis, preventive, and diagnosis measures; and manage co-infections and complications that are associated with HIV.
