Contents
Stem cell therapy for the second time in history has proven successful in treating a patient infected with HIV. One transplant was enough. More than 2,5 years have passed since the virus has not made itself known.
He had HIV and had cancer. He recovered thanks to a transplant
Adam Castillejo is the second person in the world to be cured of HIV. The London resident has been free from the virus for over 30 months. It’s been so long since he finished his antiretroviral therapy.
This is confirmed by scientific reports published in the journal “The Lancet HIV”. The man was helped by the stem cells with which he was treated due to the appearance of a cancer in his body (lymphoma). Adam Castillejo, after years of undergoing difficult treatments and moments of despair, decided to reveal his identity, because he wants to be an “ambassador of hope”.
Find out: What is Lymphoma?
Stem cells as a chance to defeat HIV
The world heard about the first person in whom HIV has ceased to be active (Timothy Brownie from Berlin) a few years ago. He was completely cured in 2011, also after stem cell therapy. So it seems that stem cell transplants can stop the virus from replicatingif the patient’s own immune cells are replaced with donor cells that are resistant to HIV infection (a gene mutation known as CCR5-delta 32 is responsible for this).
“Our findings show that the success of stem cell transplantation as a cure for HIV, first described nine years ago in a Berlin patient, can be replicated,” clinical microbiologist Prof. Ravindra Kumar Gupta of the University of Cambridge.
However, stem cell therapy will not be the standard treatment for the millions of people worldwide who live with HIV. The use of this method carries a high riskTherefore, it is decided to implement it only as a last resort, e.g. when patients have hematological neoplasms. The safest, but also causing serious complications, is still antiretroviral therapy, which inhibits the activity of the virus and supports the immune system.
Also read: The quality of life of patients with HIV infection and new possibilities of antiretroviral therapy
However, new discoveries related to the potential of stem cells give hope in the future, gene therapy will be the key to finding a cure to deal with HIV once and for all. In the first phase of infection, HIV binds to the CCR5 receptor. It is this receptor that can be targeted by treatment, according to the researchers.
Adam Castillejo, unlike Timothy Brown, had only one stem cell transplant, not two, and did not undergo radiation therapy at all. So far, it is not possible to say with certainty whether the virus will never come back in two cured patients. Only time will show.
The editorial board recommends:
- Where is the HIV virus hiding?
- The first case of remission of HIV infection in a child
- How is HIV being fought in the world?
You haven’t been able to find the cause of your ailments for a long time? Do you want to tell us your story? Write to the address [email protected] #Together we can do more