Student     Alumni     Partners     Staff

Rare Stories of People Conquering HIV

Rare Stories of People Conquering HIV

Till these days there is no real or exact cure concerning HIV. scientists from around the world are still trying to find a drug that is really effective in curing HIV. But there are rare cases where some patients recover from HIV infection. Only two people have been intentionally and successfully cleared of the virus thus far the Berlin patient and the London patient. However, both subjects needed dangerous stem cell transplants to replenish their blood stem cells that had been destroyed during chemotherapy regimens needed to treat their HIV-induced blood cancers. The first person is known to have cleared the infection naturally is the San Francisco patient, She is a 67-year-old woman who appears to have cleared the virus in the absence of treatment after living with HIV for 28 years. The second one is a thirty-year-old female resident of Esperanza, Argentina, who was declared to be cured of HIV-1 without receiving long-term treatment. And 

Here are a more amazing rare story of people around the globe cleared from HIV

1. London patient (2019)

In 2019, a man from London was declared cured of HIV infection. However, unlike the case of the Esperanza patient, this man received a stem cell transplant and is now in HIV ‘remission’. This means that he is not on antiretroviral treatment (ART) and doctors no longer find HIV in his body. Even if doctors know, the virus may still be there.

This condition is called the functional recovery in which HIV is not completely eradicated in the body, but does not replicate or do any visible damage. In cases like this, doctors often use the term ‘remission’ rather than ‘cured’.

Diagnosed with advanced Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, a stem cell transplant combined with chemotherapy was performed as a last resort for the man after he failed to clear cancer. This type of procedure is complicated and dangerous.

The stem cell donor has two copies of the CCR5 delta-32 gene, a rare genetic mutation that makes people naturally resistant to most types of HIV. The CCR5 enzyme is essential for HIV replication because it is the most common entry point that HIV uses to infect the cells. As a result, in people with the mutation, this entry point is disabled.

2. Visconti group (2012)

In a study conducted in 2012, 14 French people living with HIV also known as the ‘Visconti group’ started ART 10 weeks after infection. After three years of treatment, they stopped taking the medication. They maintained low HIV levels for an average of seven years.

3. Berlin patient (2008)

Another case was experienced by Timothy Brown, a patient from Berlin in 2008. Initially, Timothy Brown suffered from end-stage leukemia, also had to undergo two stem cell transplants and very aggressive chemotherapy. In contrast to the London patient who only received one transplant with mild chemotherapy. In 2019, Timothy Brown had been on ART for eight years so doctors felt confident to declare himself ‘cured’.

Professor Ravindra Gupta, lead author of the London Patient study by University College London (UCL) at CROI, quoted from the Avert website ha said. “By achieving remission in a second patient using a similar approach, we have shown that the Berlin Patient was not an anomaly and that the treatment approach completely eliminated HIV in these two individuals.” Then He added. “Continuing our research, we need to understand whether we can disable these receptors in people with HIV, which is possible with gene therapy.”

4. French teenager (2015)

In July 2015, researchers announced that a French teenager who was diagnosed with HIV at birth was in good health 12 years after her last ART treatment. This is the longest known pediatric HIV case to date, living without ill effect after discontinuing treatment — adds to the overwhelming body of knowledge supporting the benefits of early treatment, and will help researchers to better understand why some patients with HIV can go into remission after ceasing treatment.

5. Mississippi baby (2013)

In 2013, a baby born with HIV in Mississippi, United States, was functionally cured of HIV. The baby was given a strong dose of three antiretroviral drugs soon after birth.

Treatment stopped at 18 months when her mother disappeared from care. However, when the mother and baby returned to treatment five months later, the baby’s viral load was no longer detectable.

Unfortunately, a year later, HIV was found in the baby again. This phenomenon is considered important in the field of research because it shows that early antiretroviral therapy that is considered aggressive can result in short-term remission in children.

Biomedicine Bachelor's Program

i3L School of Life Sciences

Biomedicine study program offered in i3L focuses on research and innovation that bridge the research on human health with drug development. 

Check Our Latest News

Post Views: 324

© 2022 Indonesia International Institute for Life Sciences. All rights reserved.