November 11, 2008
Ladies and Gentlemen, We May Have a Cure For AIDS
If you thought there was no story in the past week that could top the "feel-good" factor of an African-American winning the US Presidency, then I have something that trumps it hands down...
In Germany, a mild-mannered haemotologist named Gero Hutter has used gene-therapy to effectively cure one of his patients of AIDS. The patient, who was undergoing leukemia treatment, was given a bone marrow transplant from a donor with a genetic mutation that made the donor immune to HIV infection. This immunity was then passed on to the recipient who has now been AIDS free for 600 days.
The mutation, shared by 1% of Europeans, works by stopping the production of CCR5, a molecule that binds to the surface of cells and acts as a welcome mat to the HIV virus. (On the down side, the absence of CCR5 might render an individual more likely to die from other diseases like the West Nile virus.)
The role of CCR5 inhibition in the treatment of AIDS is already widely acknowledged and drugs are currently being developed to exploit it, but this is the first time that a gene therapy with this strategy has been trialled effectively.
Naturally, it's early days; but the initial results are something to get seriously excited about.