Maybe it's just me being jaded after at least 15 years (or at least it feels like it) of the HIV cure "coming soon" and the personal impact this has had on my community and multiple friends (LGBT).
This article being written kinda bothers me? By the authors own admission we know almost nothing. We really just know it's safe but don't even know if anyone stopped taking their ART.
Sure it's great that we are not getting a setback from it being unsafe... but I am just tired of hearing about the false starts that time and time again turn out ineffective.
Like I said maybe I am just jaded here but something about this rubs me the wrong way.
I'm kind of torn since I hate PR nonsense like this but I'm also glad that HIV research is still getting money and happening - you can't take for granted that there would be enough incentive for people to even keep trying in our current system
That is very valid, I guess I may have a certain view since HIV is not something that I need to read an article to be reminded of? It is basically a daily thought for me.
I should be clear that I am happy that the research is being done, its just this article isn't (unless I missed it) isn't even a PR piece for the company doing it? A company putting out the actual PR is perfectly valid and I think a standard practice.
The article is written in a very ambigious manner.
Lots of 'cure' mentions while admitting the treatment is not a cure. Trials run with ambigious results, and Excision is protecting the data until 2024.
Honestly not sure if I read an article at all. It reads like a 'keep alive' ping from an old space probe reporting back it's still alive status.
imo, progress usually can't be made without mistakes. There may be many 'coming soon' cures, but a lot will fail, some will cure other things than original disease, some will advance understanding of the disease and gradually, progress is made from different directions
HIV is extremely challenging to cure, since it writes itself into your blood's stem cell DNA and even if you could somehow wipe out every individual viral unit in your body at once, your own cells can still express that DNA and recreate the virus from scratch.
We've seen blood cancer patients cured of HIV after getting a bone marrow transplant, where the stem cells in their own bone marrow are wiped out before being replaced with stem cells from a healthy donor, but that's a little too extreme a procedure for widespread use.
> A man dubbed the 'Geneva patient' appears to be the latest person cured of HIV after a stem cell transplant for cancer treatment. Unlike the other five known cases, however, he received stem cells from a donor who does not have a rare mutation that prevents HIV from entering cells. The man continues to have undetectable HIV 20 months after stopping antiretroviral therapy (ART).
If you’re dog and ponying your new treatment, and the best you can say is “the side effects resolved on their own,” you have to assume the efficacy was disappointing.
Testing for safety only at first is just following the normal procedure.
> Researchers conduct clinical trials in a series of steps called phases.
Phase I trials: Researchers test a medicine or other treatment in a small group of people for the first time. The purpose is to learn about the best dosage for a medicine or other treatment and to learn about the safety and side effects.
Phase II trials: Researchers study the new medicine or treatment in a larger group of people to determine its effectiveness and to further study its safety.
Phase III trials: Researchers give the new medicine or treatment to an even larger group of participants to confirm its effectiveness, monitor side effects, compare it with standard or similar treatments or a placebo , and collect information that will allow the new medicine or treatment to be used safely.
Phase IV trials: After the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approves a medicine or treatment and it is made available to the public, researchers track its safety in the general population, seeking more information about the medicine or treatment’s benefits and optimal use.
I agree with your logic that if they got surprisingly good efficacy results they would have reported it, but the Phase I participants received a much smaller dose than the planned actual treatment.
It would have been great if the treatment had clinical efficacy at even the safety dosing level, but it's also not especially disappointing that it didn't.
undetectable levels are dectectable? So using CRISPER to eradicate HIV that you can not detect means you can't detect it after as well. This is not science.
This article being written kinda bothers me? By the authors own admission we know almost nothing. We really just know it's safe but don't even know if anyone stopped taking their ART.
Sure it's great that we are not getting a setback from it being unsafe... but I am just tired of hearing about the false starts that time and time again turn out ineffective.
Like I said maybe I am just jaded here but something about this rubs me the wrong way.