quote:

For the first time, a man has been declared officially cured of HIV. The remedy may nearly have killed him, but it opens a door—just a crack—to hope that we may someday kill off the scourge for good.

Strangely enough, the diagnosis that most concerned Timothy Ray Brown in 2007 was acute myeloid leukemia. HIV has been increasingly thought of as a manageable disease, though certainly a terribly burdensome one. What brought the 42-year old Brown under the care of Germany's Charite Universitatsmedizin Berlin hospital was the more immediate threat his cancer posed.

The treatment Brown underwent was aggressive: chemotherapy that destroyed the majority of his immune cells. Total body irradiation. Finally, a risky stem-cell transplant that nearly a third of patients don't survive—but that appears to have completely cured Brown of HIV.

Doctors were savvy when they chose a stem cell donor for Brown. The man whose bone marrow they used has a particular genetic mutation, present in an incredibly small percentage of people, that makes him almost invulnerable to HIV. With Brown's own defenses decimated by treatments, the healthy, HIV-resistant donor cells repopulated his immune system. The initial indications that the virus had abated were promising. But only just now, having taken no antiretroviral drugs since the transplant, and following extensive testing shows no signs whatsoever of HIV, have his doctors given the official word:

He's cured.

What does this mean for the future of treatment? It's not as though every HIV patient can or would want to go through the tremendous suffering that was prelude to Brown's recovery, or be able to afford the procedure if they could or did. But for the first time, we know that HIV can be cured, not just managed. It opens new avenues of research—gene therapy, stem cell treatments—that may otherwise have been thought dead ends. [AIDS Map]

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Originally posted by dadudemon
the fact that it was stem cells made me even happier. Take THAT conservatard theists.

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Originally posted by Robtard
I posted about the CCR5 mutation years ago in here, glad to see process was actually done with it since then.

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Originally posted by Shakyamunison
I wonder if they could ever make something like a vaccine out of the mutation?

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Originally posted by Robtard
There's billions to be made in prolonging the lives of HIV patients for decades with daily pills and injections, less in outright curing them.

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Originally posted by ADarksideJedi
I am glad that they found a cure but am not glad that they are useing stem cells to cure it.

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Originally posted by ADarksideJedi
I am glad that they found a cure but am not glad that they are useing stem cells to cure it.

quote:

"Doctors were savvy when they chose a stem cell donor for Brown. The man whose bone marrow they used"

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Originally posted by Robtard
When I had posted, there was some guy working that. He happened to be part of the very small population that carries the mutation.

No idea how far he's come though. I'd also imagine the pharmeceutical giants would want to suppress a vaccine/cure. There's billions to be made in prolonging the lives of HIV patients for decades with daily pills and injections, less in outright curing them.

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Originally posted by Zeal Ex Nihilo
AIDS is vengeance from God and we need to make sure that all **** die from it because that will teach them to sin against nature.

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Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
But if the technology to make the cure is out there someone will release it. Even if the upfront cost is high due to big companies not wanting to use it people will pay to not have the disease hanging over their heads.

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Originally posted by Zeal Ex Nihilo
AIDS is vengeance from God and we need to make sure that all **** die from it because that will teach them to sin against nature.

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Originally posted by Robtard
More heterosexuals have the disease and die from it than homosexuals, so your God is as inept as RogueJedi's manager.

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Originally posted by Zeal Ex Nihilo
AIDS is God's vengeance against fornicators and adulterers, so we need to make sure that all the **** die because that will teach them to sin against nature.

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Originally posted by Robtard
Newborns get HIV/AIDS too, your God is inept. Sorry.

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Originally posted by Zeal Ex Nihilo
God hates children born to atheists.