Researchers
believe that there will be a breakthrough in finding a cure for HIV “within
months”.
The Telegraph, Jake Wallis Simons, 27 Apr 2013
 |
With modern HIV treatment if medication is stopped, HIV reservoirs become
active and start to produce more of the virus Photo: Alamy |
Danish
scientists are expecting results that will show that “finding a
mass-distributable and affordable cure to HIV is possible”.
They are
conducting clinical trials to test a “novel strategy” in which the HIV virus is
stripped from human DNA and destroyed permanently by the immune system.
The move
would represent a dramatic step forward in the attempt to find a cure for the
virus, which causes Aids.
The
scientists are currently conducting human trials on their treatment, in the
hope of proving that it is effective. It has already been found to work in
laboratory tests.
The
technique involves releasing the HIV virus from “reservoirs” it forms in DNA
cells, bringing it to the surface of the cells. Once it comes to the surface,
the body’s natural immune system can kill the virus through being boosted by a
“vaccine”.
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In vitro
studies — those that use human cells in a laboratory — of the new technique
proved so successful that in January, the Danish Research Council awarded the
team 12 million Danish kroner (£1.5 million) to pursue their findings in
clinical trials with human subjects.
These are
now under way, and according to Dr Søgaard, the early signs are “promising”.
Dr Ole
Søgaard, a senior researcher at the Aarhus University Hospital in Denmark who
is part of the research team, said: “I am almost certain that we will be
successful in releasing the reservoirs of HIV.
“The
challenge will be getting the patients’ immune system to recognise the virus
and destroy it. This depends on the strength and sensitivity of individual
immune systems.”
Fifteen
patients are currently taking part in the trials, and if they are found to have
successfully been cured of HIV, the “cure” will be tested on a wider scale.
Dr Søgaard
stressed that a cure is not the same as a preventative vaccine, and that
raising awareness of unsafe behaviour, including unprotected sex and sharing
needles, remains of paramount importance in combating HIV.
With modern
HIV treatment, a patient can live an almost normal life, even into old age,
with limited side effects.
However, if
medication is stopped, HIV reservoirs become active and start to produce more
of the virus, meaning that symptoms can reappear within two weeks.
Finding a
cure would free a patient from the need to take continuous HIV medication, and
save health services billions of pounds.
The
technique is being researched in Britain, but studies have not yet moved on to
the clinical trial stage. Five universities — Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial
College, London, University College, London and King’s College, London — have
jointly formed the Collaborative HIV Eradication of Reservoirs UK Biomedical
Research Centre group (CHERUB), which is dedicated to finding an HIV cure.
They have
applied to the Medical Research Council for funding to conduct clinical trials,
which will seek to combine techniques to release the reservoirs of HIV with
immunotherapy to destroy the virus.
In
addition, they are focusing on patients that have only recently been infected,
as they believe this will improve chances of a cure. The group hopes to receive
a funding decision in May.
“When the
first patient is cured in this way it will be a spectacular moment,” says Dr
John Frater, a clinical research fellow at the Nuffield School of Medicine,
Oxford University, and a member of the CHERUB group.
“It will
prove that we are heading in the right direction and demonstrate that a cure is
possible. But I think it will be five years before we see a cure that can be
offered on a large scale.”
The Danish
team’s research is among the most advanced and fast moving in the world, as
that they have streamlined the process of putting the latest basic science
discoveries into clinical testing.
This means that
researchers can progress more quickly to clinical trials, accelerating the
process and reaching reliable results sooner than many others.
The
technique uses drugs called HDAC Inhibitors, which are more commonly used in
treating cancer, to drive out the HIV from a patient’s DNA. The Danish
researchers are using a particularly powerful type of HDAC inhibitor called
Panobinostat.
Five years
ago, the general consensus was that HIV could not be cured. But then Timothy
Ray Brown, an HIV sufferer — who has become known in the field as the Berlin
Patient — developed leukaemia.
He had a
bone marrow transplant from a donor with a rare genetic mutation that made his
cells resistant to HIV. As a result, in 2007 Mr Brown became the first man to
ever be fully cured of the disease.
Replicating
this procedure on a mass scale is impossible. Nevertheless, the Brown case
caused a sea change in research, with scientists focusing on finding a cure as
well as suppressing the symptoms.
Two
principal approaches are currently being pursued. The first, gene therapy, aims
to make a patient’s immune system resistant to HIV. This is complex and
expensive, and not easily transferrable to diverse gene pools around the world.
The second
approach is the one being pursued by Dr Søgaard and his colleagues in Denmark,
the CHERUB group in Britain, and by other laboratories in the United States and
Europe.
