
Alcoholism drug brings dormant HIV virus out of hiding - ddispaltro
http://www.sciencealert.com/alcoholism-drug-brings-dormant-hiv-virus-out-of-hiding
======
danieltillett
I despair at current medical science. 30 people for 3 days, unblinded [1], and
this is considered of significance? On top of this the whole study is probably
unethical since the participants can’t have gained any benefit.

The whole idea seems to have no chance given the results of this study [2, 3].

1\.
[http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanhiv/article/PIIS2352-30...](http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanhiv/article/PIIS2352-3018\(15\)00226-X/abstract)

2\.
[http://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lanhiv/PIIS2352-3018(...](http://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lanhiv/PIIS2352-3018\(14\)70014-1.pdf)

3\.
[http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanhiv/article/PIIS2352-30...](http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanhiv/article/PIIS2352-3018\(14\)00009-5/fulltext)

~~~
PepeGomez
>30 people for 3 days, unblinded [1], and this is considered of significance?

Why not, if the effect is big enoug?

------
DrScump
Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't see evidence that this is the latent
HIV _leaving_ its hidden reservoirs (and making all of it instances vulnerable
to treatment) rather than just _reproducing_ more virus copies into the
bloodstream while remaining in the hidden reservoirs.

~~~
danieltillett
That is because there is no evidence. It can actually be worse than this as
the increase can come from an increase in reproduction in newly susceptible
cells.

I have not kept up with this area, but the way to solve this is to work on
SIV. Work out the drug combination in primates that will chase SIV out of
hiding and cure monkeys then move into humans.

------
fgtx
> we saw a clear increase in [the] virus in [blood] plasma

Couldn't this be due to the virus actually multiplying instead of waking up?

~~~
danieltillett
Technically to get HIV reproduction you need to wake up the virus, but if you
are seeing more reproduction while the patient is on very effective HAART then
it is not a good sign. What you want to see is a reduction in the integrated
HIV (i.e. HIV DNA). Unfortunately, even with much stronger drugs this was not
seen even after 8 weeks (see my main post above for the references).

