The History and Development of Lopinavir as an Antiretroviral Drug

• Marcia Facundo
• June 28, 2023 AT 04:32

I remember when my cousin was first diagnosed. Lopinavir was one of the only things keeping him alive back then. It’s wild to think how far we’ve come.

• Ajay Kumar
• June 30, 2023 AT 03:26

Let me tell you something nobody else will-Lopinavir isn’t even the best protease inhibitor anymore. The real breakthrough was darunavir, which has better resistance profiles, lower hepatotoxicity, and doesn’t require ritonavir boosting in most cases. But no, the pharmaceutical industry clings to Kaletra like it’s still 2003 because it’s profitable, not because it’s optimal. The WHO still lists it as essential? That’s a joke. We’re still treating global health like a relic museum instead of a dynamic science.

• Joseph Kiser
• July 1, 2023 AT 02:46

This is why I love medicine. 🤝 It’s not just chemistry-it’s human resilience. Lopinavir didn’t just inhibit a virus, it gave people back years. Decades. A chance to see their kids graduate. To hold their grandkids. That’s the real win. Science isn’t about patents-it’s about people who were told they’d be dead by 30 and are now celebrating 60th birthdays. 🙌

• Hazel Wolstenholme
• July 2, 2023 AT 05:57

While I appreciate the sentimental narrative, one must interrogate the epistemological underpinnings of conflating therapeutic efficacy with cultural heroism. Lopinavir’s pharmacokinetic profile is, frankly, archaic-high pill burden, drug interactions galore, and suboptimal CNS penetration. The romanticization of its historical role obscures the fact that modern regimens render it obsolete in high-resource settings. One might even argue that its continued promotion in low-income nations constitutes a form of pharmaceutical paternalism.

• Mike Laska
• July 3, 2023 AT 18:49

I swear to god, I was in a clinic in rural Alabama in 2005 and saw a guy take his first dose of Kaletra. He cried. Not because he was sick-because he finally thought he might live to see Christmas. That’s not science. That’s magic. And it’s still happening today.

• Alexa Apeli
• July 5, 2023 AT 13:20

This is such a beautiful tribute to medical innovation! 🌟 The dedication of researchers, the courage of trial participants, and the perseverance of patients-it’s a symphony of human determination. Thank you for highlighting this pivotal chapter in global health. 💫

• Eileen Choudhury
• July 5, 2023 AT 18:33

In India, we called it the 'miracle pill'-even if it tasted like burnt plastic and made your stomach rebel. But it kept people alive. My uncle took it for 12 years straight. He never missed a dose. He lived to see his daughter get married. That’s more than any drug label can say.

• Zachary Sargent
• July 5, 2023 AT 22:24

Okay but did anyone else notice how the article just glossed over the fact that Lopinavir caused severe diarrhea in like 70% of patients? Like, yeah it saved lives but also turned your butt into a malfunctioning faucet? No one talks about that.

• Melissa Kummer
• July 6, 2023 AT 11:50

The development of heat-stable formulations represents a monumental leap in equitable access. This is precisely the kind of innovation that transforms global health paradigms from theoretical ideals into tangible, life-sustaining realities.

• andrea navio quiros
• July 8, 2023 AT 03:46

Lopinavir was a start but we moved on it’s not the future it’s the past and honestly the way people still talk about it like it’s magic is kinda sad we have way better now like cabotegravir injections and everyone just clings to old stuff because change is hard

• Pradeep Kumar
• July 9, 2023 AT 05:09

In my village, we used to get shipments of Kaletra in boxes with ice packs. People would walk 10 km just to pick it up. One day, a woman brought her 5-year-old son and said, 'He’s the first in our family to not be afraid of the dark anymore.' That’s what this drug did. Not just pills. Hope.

• Andy Ruff
• July 10, 2023 AT 00:43

Let’s be real-this whole thing was a corporate cash grab wrapped in a humanitarian blanket. Abbott knew exactly how to milk the AIDS crisis. They priced Kaletra at $10,000 a year in the U.S. while denying generic access to Africa for years. The 'heroic breakthrough' narrative is just PR. Real progress came from activists forcing them to lower prices, not from some lab white coat.

• Matthew Kwiecinski
• July 10, 2023 AT 19:41

The FDA approval date was September 2000, but phase III trials were completed in late 1999. The timeline in the article is misleading. Also, the combination with ritonavir was not discovered during clinical trials-it was a serendipitous pharmacokinetic observation from a failed HIV drug trial in 1997. The article oversimplifies the science.

• Justin Vaughan
• July 11, 2023 AT 08:40

You know what’s wild? Lopinavir’s structure helped design drugs for hepatitis C and even some coronaviruses. It’s like this molecule was a blueprint for a whole generation of antivirals. We didn’t just treat HIV-we learned how to fight viruses better because of it. That’s legacy.

• Manuel Gonzalez
• July 11, 2023 AT 10:10

Thanks for sharing this. Really well written. It’s easy to forget how much progress we’ve made when you’re just scrolling through headlines. This was a good reminder.