SHUTTERSTOCK
A Norwegian drug firm believes they have made significant ground in finding a cure for HIV
Although the trial was small, the drug firm believes it offers a significant step forward.
SHUTTERSTOCK
AFP reports that a trial with 17 HIV-positive patients yielded a “statistically significant decrease” in the virus.
The sample might be small but the firm, called Bionor, believes that it’s a “achievement on the path to a functional cure for HIV.”
HIV/AIDS does not have a cure currently, but with but anti-retroviral treatments, people can live longer and healthier lives by delaying and subduing symptoms.
But the treatment does affect some people differently. The virus hides away in cells and remerges once therapy stops and this has been one of the biggest hurdles in finding a cure.
“Waking up” the virus and then destroying it – the so-called “kick-and-kill” approach – is a promising strategy for ridding patients of HIV.
According to AFP Bionor’s approach involves an anti-cancer drug called romidepsin to wake up the dormant HIV, and a vaccine called Vacc-4x to prime the body’s own immune T-cells to recognise and destroy the virus.
