Stem-cell transplants may purge HIV

This was one of the biggest science news stories of the past week, but what some people may not realise is that the bone marrow transplant process actually has a higher mortality rate (15 to 20%) than HIV - most patients with HIV who are given the right medication have a normal life expectancy. So while it's a great breakthrough, for now this isn't going to be the best treatment option for the majority of HIV sufferers.

Read more: http://bit.ly/17HPPmP via Nature, above quote and image: All Science, all the time

Stem-cell transplants may purge HIV
But treatment is too risky for most people infected by the virus.
Erika Check Hayden
03 July 2013

Two men with HIV may have been cured after they received stem-cell transplants to treat the blood cancer lymphoma, their doctors announced today at the International AIDS Society Conference in Kuala Lumpur.

One of the men received stem-cell transplants to replace his blood-cell-producing bone marrow about three years ago, and the other five years ago. Their regimens were similar to one used on Timothy Ray Brown, the 'Berlin patient' who has been living HIV-free for six years and is the only adult to have been declared cured of HIV.

If the men stay healthy, they would be the third and fourth patients ever to be cured of HIV, after Brown and a baby in Mississippi who received antiretroviral therapy soon after birth.

But Henrich and Daniel Kuritzkes, a colleague at Brigham who also worked with the men, caution that it is still too early know whether or not the Boston patients have been cured.

If you read more in the article, the exciting part about the stem cell therapy is that the stem cells used were not specifically chosen from an HIV-resistant donor (unlike the 'Berlin patient') making the potential therapy more available for others. Still not an optimal way to remove the virus, but at least it's something.