Interesting article on a "cure" for HIV. Thought it may be of some interest given current triels bu BIT with HIV.
Successful cure of HIV infection after stem cell transplantation, study suggests -- ScienceDailySuccessfulcure of HIV infection after stem cell transplantation, study suggests
Date:
February 24, 2023
Source:
German Center forInfection Research
Summary:
Haematopoietic stemcell transplantation for the treatment of severe blood cancers is the onlymedical intervention that has cured two people living with HIV in the past. Aninternational group of physicians and researchers has now identified anothercase in which HIV infection has been shown to be cured in the same way. Thesuccessful healing process of this third patient was for the first timecharacterized in great detail virologically and immunologically over a timespan of ten years.
Haematopoietic stem cell transplantation for the treatment of severeblood cancers is the only medical intervention that has cured two people livingwith HIV in the past. An international group of physicians and researchers fromGermany, the Netherlands, France, Spain, and the United States has nowidentified another case in which HIV infection has been shown to be cured inthe same way. In a study published this week in Nature Medicine, inwhich DZIF scientists from Hamburg and Cologne played a leading role, thesuccessful healing process of this third patient was for the first timecharacterised in great detail virologically and immunologically over a timespan of ten years.
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An infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) was previouslyconsidered incurable. The reason for this is that the virus "sleeps"in the genome of infected cells for long periods of time, making it invisibleand inaccessible to both the immune system and antiviral drugs. The"Düsseldorf patient," a 53-year-old man, is now the third person inthe world to be completely cured of the HI virus by a stem cell transplant.
The patient, treated at the University Hospital Düsseldorf for his HIVinfection, had received a stem cell transplant due to a blood cancer. As in thecases of the first two patients named "Berlin" and"London," the Düsseldorf patient received stem cells from a healthydonor whose genome contains a mutation in the gene for the HIV-1 co-receptorCCR5. This mutation makes it impossible for most HI viruses to enter human CD4+T-lymphocytes, their major target cells.
Following transplantation, the patient was carefully monitoredvirologically and immunologically for almost ten years. Using a variety ofsensitive techniques, the researchers analysed the patient's blood and tissuesamples to closely monitor immune responses to HIV and the continued presenceor even replication of the virus. Already shortly after transplantation andover the entire course of the study years, neither replicating virus norantibodies or reactive immune cells against HIV were detected. More than fouryears ago, the antiviral therapy against HIV was discontinued. Ten years aftertransplantation and four years after the end of anti-HIV therapy, theDüsseldorf patient could be declared cured by the international researchconsortium.
"This case of curing a chronic HIV infection by stem celltransplantation shows that HIV can in principle be cured," says Prof.Julian Schulze zur Wiesch, DZIF scientist at the University Medical CenterHamburg-Eppendorf and one of the study leads. "In particular, the resultsof this study are also enormously important for further research into a curefor HIV for the vast majority of people living with HIV for whom stem celltransplantation is not an option."
