Cancer has become more common among persons with HIV. After examination of cumulative cancer incidence by age 75 years and calendar trends in cumulative incidence and hazard rates, it was determine... Background: Cancer is increasingly common among persons with HIV. Objective: To examine calendar trends in cumulative cancer incidence and hazard rate by HIV status. Design: Cohort study. Setting: ...

BACKGROUND: Survival after a glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) diagnosis remained static during the several decades before 1999. We hypothesized that the progressive increase in temozolomide use for GBM treatment that began in 1999 in the United States would be paralleled by a corresponding improvement in survival.METHODS: We included 19,674 GBM cases, ages 20 years or greater, diagnosed 1993 to 2007 in the population‐based Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results Program database. We used proportional hazards models to calculate calendar period hazard ratios (HR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI), adjusted for demographic covariates. We compared survival across periods using the Kaplan‐Meier method.RESULTS: Starting with cases diagnosed in 1999 to 2001, we observed a progressive decrease in HRs compared with cases diagnosed in 1993 to 1995. The multivariate‐adjusted HR for 2005 to 2007 versus 1993 to 1995 was 0.69 (95% CI, 0.65‐0.72). Age‐stratified analyses revealed that this progressive decrease occurred in all age groups except 80+ years. Two‐year survival increased from 7% among cases diagnosed in 1993 to 1995 and 1996 to 1998 to 9% among cases diagnosed in 1999 to 2001, 13% in 2002 to 2004, and 17% in 2005 to 2007. The disparity in survival between young and old patients increased in the temozolomide era, with 2‐year survival of 39% among cases diagnosed at ages 20 to 44 years and 1% among cases diagnosed at 80+ years in 2005 to 2007.CONCLUSIONS: We observed a modest, but meaningful, population‐based survival improvement for GBM patients in the United States. Widespread adoption of temozolomide represents the most likely explanation, although other treatment advances, such as increased extent of surgical resection, also may have played a role. Cancer 2012;. © 2011 American Cancer Society.

Improved understanding of the effects of meteorological conditions on the transmission of SARS-CoV-2, the causative agent for COVID-19 disease, is needed. Here, we estimate the relationship between air temperature, specific humidity, and ultraviolet radiation and SARS-CoV-2 transmission in 2669 U.S. counties with abundant reported cases from March 15 to December 31, 2020. Specifically, we quantify the associations of daily mean temperature, specific humidity, and ultraviolet radiation with daily estimates of the SARS-CoV-2 reproduction number (R_t) and calculate the fraction of R_t attributable to these meteorological conditions. Lower air temperature (within the 20–40 °C range), lower specific humidity, and lower ultraviolet radiation were significantly associated with increased R_t. The fraction of R_t attributable to temperature, specific humidity, and ultraviolet radiation were 3.73% (95% empirical confidence interval [eCI]: 3.66–3.76%), 9.35% (95% eCI: 9.27–9.39%), and 4.44% (95% eCI: 4.38–4.47%), respectively. In total, 17.5% of R_t was attributable to meteorological factors. The fractions attributable to meteorological factors generally were higher in northern counties than in southern counties. Our findings indicate that cold and dry weather and low levels of ultraviolet radiation are moderately associated with increased SARS-CoV-2 transmissibility, with humidity playing the largest role.

Purpose of review Combination antiretroviral therapy (ART) has turned HIV infection into a complex chronic disease. This article documents cancer risk among HIV-infected persons, reviews immune system effects of HIV infection in relation to cancer risk, discusses implications for cancer prevention, and suggests future research directions. Recent findings There has been a shift in the cancer spectrum from AIDS-defining cancers (ADC) to non-ADC, although the burden of ADC remains high. Although a high prevalence of non-HIV cancer risk factors among HIV-infected persons contributes to cancer risk, substantial evidence has accumulated in favor of an independent association between HIV-induced immunodeficiency and elevated risk of many specific cancer types, most of viral cause, although further work is needed to disentangle immunodeficiency and smoking effects for lung cancer, and immunodeficiency and hepatitis virus effects for liver cancer. Relationships between cancer risk and two other immune system hallmarks of HIV infection, chronic inflammation, and immune dysfunction/senescence, remain poorly understood. Summary Early, sustained ART is a crucial component of cancer prevention. Continued epidemiologic monitoring is needed to detect possible effects on cancer risk of specific ART classes or medications, long-term exposure to systemic inflammation or immune dysfunction, or earlier or more effective ART.

We hypothesized that race/ethnic group, sex, age, and/or calendar period variation in adult glioma incidence differs between the two broad subtypes of glioblastoma (GBM) and non-GBM. Primary GBM, which constitute 90-95% of GBM, differ from non-GBM with respect to a number of molecular characteristics, providing a molecular rationale for these two broad glioma subtypes.