Is there a cure?There have been a few reports of cures on scientific platforms. The first published case was of a man who appears to have been cured. He received treatment for cancer in Germany, including chemotherapy and radiation. Finally, he had a bone-marrow transplant from a donor with natural resistance to HIV (which the researchers had specifically sought). The “cure,” a stem cell transplant fortified with a particular sort of HIV-resistant strain, was grueling, brutal, and risky. The patient had a one-in-three chance of dying from each of the two transplants.
Treating everyone with HIV in this way is not practical, affordable or safe (it would require total destruction of the immune system using chemotherapy and radiation - and then to find a bone marrow donor who also has resistance to HIV). But the case has energized researchers who are now looking for ways to replicate the cure. For more see here |
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Cured Baby
At the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections in 2013, researchers announced the first case of a baby who seems to have been cured. The baby, born in the USA, received therapeutic doses of antiretroviral treatment very soon after birth (within 31 hours) for at least 18 months. Early and aggressive treatment as a plausible cure strategy is also being studied in the VISCONTI trial in adults who are diagnosed very soon after infection.
A generation of babies who are HIV negative - now that is even better than cure
It is possible for HIV positive people to have children and NOT to infect their babies. Thanks to short-course ARV therapy (called PMTCT - Prevention of Mother To Child Transmission) pregnant HIV positive women can reduce their chance of infecting their baby to less than 1%. This means that 99 out of 100 babies born to HIV positive mothers will be born HIV negative. We even have mounting evidence that women who take ARVs can safely breastfeed their baby and enjoy the natural bonding and powerful life giving act that HIV negative women take for granted. That is powerful stuff.
VaccinesTo date, only one vaccine regimen has shown any promise in preventing HIV in clinical trials. A study called RV144 conducted in Thailand showed about 30% efficacy of two vaccines in combination: AIDSVAX and ALVAC. However, Thailand has different HIV subtypes to South Africa. Dr Laher leads the clinical research team at the Perinatal HIV Research Unit to find out more about these vaccines in the South African context. The trial, called HVTN 097, started mid-2013, and should conclude by the end of 2014.
FALSE AND FRAUDULENT CURES; claims abound: see this video from Siyanqoba
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