American researchers are on the trail of a new therapy against AIDS. They managed to genetically modify immune cells from 12 HIV-infected patients to create natural resistance to the virus. These modified cells were injected into the body of patients and this allowed them to lower the viral load (the level of virus present in the body) while reducing their treatment with antiretrovirals.
Create natural resistance to the AIDS virus
“This clinical study shows that it is possible to safely and effectively modify the immune cells, T lymphocytes, of an HIV-positive patient to create natural resistance to HIV,” said Dr Dr Carl June, professor of immunotherapy at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine (USA).
Dr June’s team treated all 12 patients with a single infusion of around 10 billion genetically engineered T cells, between May 2009 and July 2012. Six were off antiretrovirals for 12 weeks, starting one month after treatment. infusion, while the other six continued their antiretroviral therapy.
The viral load fell sharply in these patients and in particular in 4 patients who had stopped taking antiretrovirals.
Fight against AIDS: new encouraging results
This new therapy is one of the encouraging results in the fight against AIDS presented at the great Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) which took place this week in Boston, United States. It was also during this conference that doctors learned that a second HIV-positive baby was in remission after being treated with antiretrovirals from birth.