Some people with HIV have the ability to seemingly miraculously control this disease without lifelong antiviral drugs or dangerous bone marrow transplants. And now new research is suggesting how this “elite” group will clear the infection.
Less than 0.5% HIVAccording to a study published in the journal on August 26, even though some latent viruses continue to persist in the body, the virus stops replicating without the need for drugs .. HIV lurks inside human genes, but new research suggests that these genes may push pathogens into regions of the genome where they cannot copy, New York Times reportedTherefore, it prevents the virus from replicating and keeps the infection under control.
For one patient, the researcher Virus Blood cells, or cells from her intestine or rectum, The Times reported. A 66-year-old patient named Loreen Willenberg successfully suppressed the virus for decades without drug therapy and has been in the HIV study for over 25 years.
Scientists have known her case for years, but data from new studies probably suggest that she is considered “cured” from the infection. To date, only two people in the world are considered to have completely cured HIV, both of whom have undergone a bone marrow transplant to render their immune system resistant to the virus, Previously reported live sciences.. Willenberg will join a short list of fully recovered HIV patients if he can confirm that they are virus-free.
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“She was able to add to the list of things I consider to be a cure in a completely different way,” Dr. Sharon Lewin, director of the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, involved compared to bone marrow transplants. Not study told the Times.
Meanwhile, a non-study virologist, Dr. Una Odherty of the University of Pennsylvania, said more data are needed before confirming Willenburg’s functional cure of HIV. “It’s certainly encouraging, but speculative,” Odherty told The Times.
The study authors found that some people taking HIV antivirals could recover if their internal viruses were also trapped in genetic prisons and unable to replicate, as did Willenberg. I suspect it could reach. In fact, according to the New York Times, about 10% of people with drug control of HIV can stop taking antiviral drugs and continue to control the virus without assistance. New research suggests how it is possible.
“It suggests that the treatment itself heals people and goes against all doctrines,” said Dr. Steve Dicks, a research author at the University of California, San Francisco, an AIDS expert.
In addition to Willenberg, the study included 63 people who suppressed the virus without antiviral drugs, the Times said. Of the 64 patients, 11 stood out as the “exceptional controller.” These individuals had detectable levels of virus in dense regions of the genome that cells were not easily accessible to. HIV normally hijacks the cellular machinery used to make proteins and instead makes copies of itself, but when the HIV gene is sequestered by a particular gene, the pathogen has no way to replicate.
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By analyzing the immune cells of study participants, the authors came up with the theory of how the virus would get stuck in the first place. They suspect that in some people, immune cells, called T cells, target and kill infected cells that carry HIV in a readily accessible part of the genome in a region that is copyable of HIV. Dr. Xu Yu, senior author of the Ragon Institute, told Times that HIV remains intact in cells trapped in “blocked and locked” regions of the genome.
“That’s really the only explanation,” says the researcher, who says why the virus persists in some cells that cannot replicate, says Dr. Bruce Walker, a researcher at the research author Ragon Institute. I talked to the New York Times.
Since submitting the results of the study, the authors have found several other people, such as Willenberg, who could cure HIV effectively, Yu told the New York Times. “I definitely believe that many of them are out there,” he said. The team also aims to investigate HIV-infected individuals who have been taking antiviral drugs for decades and to see if the immune system also locks the virus in genetic prisons.
Still, it is unclear if the findings will apply to most people with HIV. “Of course, the real challenge is how we can intervene to relate this to the 37 million people living with HIV,” Lewin told the Times. In other words, can these findings pave the way for functional treatment for others with the disease? We need more data to know for sure.
Originally published in Live Science.
