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http://www.foxnews.com/health/2010/12/14/doctors-claim-hiv-positive-man-cured-stem-cell-transplant/
There’s
an estimated 33 million people worldwide living with HIV/AIDS, and now
doctors believe one of them may have been cured of the virus after
receiving a stem cell transplant in 2007, the medical journal Blood
reported.
Timothy Ray Brown, an HIV-positive American living in Germany, had leukemia and was undergoing chemotherapy,
when he received a transplant of stem cells from a donor carrying a
rare, inherited gene mutation that seems to make carriers virtually
immune to HIV infection.
The transplant appeared to wipe out both
diseases, giving hope to doctors, but Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of
the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who has
been studying HIV/AIDS for almost 30 years, said while this is an
interesting proof of concept, it’s absurdly impractical.
“It’s hard enough to get a good compatible
match for a transplant like this,” Fauci told FoxNews.com, “But you
also have to find compatible donor that has this genetic defect, and
this defect is only found in 1 percent of the Caucasian population and
zero percent of the black population. This is very rare.”
Fauci said while this patient is “functionally cured” this is not something you can do with every HIV-infected individual.
“This is not prime time to me at all,” he
said. “This is a very unusual situation that has little practical
application for a simple reason. This donor not only had to be a good
compatible match, but the donor had to have a genetic defect of cells
that do not express the receptor that the HIV virus needs to enter the
cell.”
Fauci also pointed to the fact that this
transplant process is not only expensive, it’s incredibly painful and
complicated, and requires the patient to start a whole new regimen of
drugs.
“This patient is trading one poison for
another. He may not have to be on antiretroviral drugs anymore, but he
has to take immunosuppressant drugs now to prevent the rejection of his
transplant cells. Again, what this is, is an interesting proof of
concept, but it’s absolutely impractical.”
Dr. Thomas Quinn, director of Johns Hopkins
Center for Global Health told FoxNews.com that he is very familiar with
the “Berlin patient” case.
“This was a new report that looked much
deeper into whether HIV could still be present or lurking in the body
in some way, not cured, and since the transplant he remains viral free
and his cells appear to be resistant to infection,” he said.
Quinn said he agrees with the researchers
on this case that it would be qualified as the first HIV cure, opening
the door to alternative means of curing HIV.
“He [Brown] has been without therapy for
three years and appears to be free of the virus,” he said. “It gives
hope to the millions of people infected with HIV that cure is a
feasible option in the future.”
Even though Brown’s procedure proved to be
successful, Quinn also warns that this was a rare case and a bone
marrow transplant is not a cure-all for other HIV patients.
“It is a near fatal procedure that he had
to have done because of the leukemia, but this procedure is very
expensive and you have to be transplanted with a donor who is shown to
be already resistant to HIV,” Quinn said. “You’re asking for a tall
order to replicate this in the future.”
Brown’s case was published in a February 2009 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
Click here to read more from the journal Blood (subscription is required).
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2010/12/14/doctors-claim-hiv-positive-man-cured-stem-cell-transplant/#ixzz18CbFysRL
There’s
an estimated 33 million people worldwide living with HIV/AIDS, and now
doctors believe one of them may have been cured of the virus after
receiving a stem cell transplant in 2007, the medical journal Blood
reported.
Timothy Ray Brown, an HIV-positive American living in Germany, had leukemia and was undergoing chemotherapy,
when he received a transplant of stem cells from a donor carrying a
rare, inherited gene mutation that seems to make carriers virtually
immune to HIV infection.
The transplant appeared to wipe out both
diseases, giving hope to doctors, but Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of
the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who has
been studying HIV/AIDS for almost 30 years, said while this is an
interesting proof of concept, it’s absurdly impractical.
“It’s hard enough to get a good compatible
match for a transplant like this,” Fauci told FoxNews.com, “But you
also have to find compatible donor that has this genetic defect, and
this defect is only found in 1 percent of the Caucasian population and
zero percent of the black population. This is very rare.”
Fauci said while this patient is “functionally cured” this is not something you can do with every HIV-infected individual.
“This is not prime time to me at all,” he
said. “This is a very unusual situation that has little practical
application for a simple reason. This donor not only had to be a good
compatible match, but the donor had to have a genetic defect of cells
that do not express the receptor that the HIV virus needs to enter the
cell.”
Fauci also pointed to the fact that this
transplant process is not only expensive, it’s incredibly painful and
complicated, and requires the patient to start a whole new regimen of
drugs.
“This patient is trading one poison for
another. He may not have to be on antiretroviral drugs anymore, but he
has to take immunosuppressant drugs now to prevent the rejection of his
transplant cells. Again, what this is, is an interesting proof of
concept, but it’s absolutely impractical.”
Dr. Thomas Quinn, director of Johns Hopkins
Center for Global Health told FoxNews.com that he is very familiar with
the “Berlin patient” case.
“This was a new report that looked much
deeper into whether HIV could still be present or lurking in the body
in some way, not cured, and since the transplant he remains viral free
and his cells appear to be resistant to infection,” he said.
Quinn said he agrees with the researchers
on this case that it would be qualified as the first HIV cure, opening
the door to alternative means of curing HIV.
“He [Brown] has been without therapy for
three years and appears to be free of the virus,” he said. “It gives
hope to the millions of people infected with HIV that cure is a
feasible option in the future.”
Even though Brown’s procedure proved to be
successful, Quinn also warns that this was a rare case and a bone
marrow transplant is not a cure-all for other HIV patients.
“It is a near fatal procedure that he had
to have done because of the leukemia, but this procedure is very
expensive and you have to be transplanted with a donor who is shown to
be already resistant to HIV,” Quinn said. “You’re asking for a tall
order to replicate this in the future.”
Brown’s case was published in a February 2009 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
Click here to read more from the journal Blood (subscription is required).
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2010/12/14/doctors-claim-hiv-positive-man-cured-stem-cell-transplant/#ixzz18CbFysRL
