Doctors have revealed that two patients being treated for lymphoma who underwent chemotherapy and bone marrow transplants involving stem cells have subsequently no trace of HIV.
The cases were presented at the International AIDS Society conference in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia yesterday. The treatment is not being considered as a cure as the technique is life threatening in itself, but AIDS experts are encouraged by the findings.
The two patients, who were on long term antiretroviral therapy when they developed Lymphoma. To treat the cancer the patients were given reduced chemoptherapy and the bone marrow transplant.
The process is similar to the one that Timothy Ray Brown underwent in 2010. Often referred to as ‘The Berlin Patient’, Mr Brown is believed to be the first person to be cured of HIV.
Doctors are not calling this approach a cure though because to implement it, they would have to weaken a person’s immune system to life threatening levels to deliver the bone marrow transplant. It is only ethically possible with patients who already have developed life threatening conditions.
