Has the World Found a Cure for HIV? Vantage with Palki Sharma
Firstpost・4 minutes read
A German man known as the Dusseldorf patient has become the fifth person to be cured of HIV through stem cell transplantation. However, this treatment is not widely available due to the risky nature of the procedure, high costs, and the challenge of finding donors immune to HIV.
Insights
- Stem cell transplantation, primarily used for cancer treatment, has successfully cured a fifth person of HIV by transferring immune cells from donors with a genetic mutation that makes them almost immune to HIV, effectively replacing the patient's infected cells.
- The limited availability of this cure is due to the high risks, costs, and scarcity of donors immune to HIV, primarily found among white individuals, posing significant barriers to widespread access to this treatment despite its promising outcomes.
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Recent questions
How was the fifth person cured of HIV?
Through stem cell transplantation.
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Summary
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Fifth HIV cure through stem cell transplant
- A fifth person has been cured of HIV through stem cell transplantation, a treatment primarily for cancer that has the side effect of curing HIV. The patient, a 53-year-old German man known as the Dusseldorf patient, stopped taking his HIV treatment in 2019 and has been declared HIV-free after four years.
- The cure involves transferring stem cells from individuals with a genetic mutation that makes them almost immune to HIV into patients with both HIV and cancer. This process replaces the patient's immune cells carrying HIV with immune cells from the donor, effectively destroying the HIV-carrying cells.
- Despite the promising results, the cure is not widely available due to the risky nature of stem cell transplants, the high costs involved, and the challenge of finding donors immune to HIV. Only a small percentage of the population is naturally immune to HIV, primarily white individuals, making it difficult to access this treatment on a large scale.
