Could new discovery lead to HIV treatment breakthrough?
Treatment of a HIV infected lung cancer patient with Opdivo (nivolumab) by physicians at the Pitie Salpetriere Hospital showed a huge decrease in the patient’s viral “reservoirs”— areas in the body that allow HIV to escape from antiretroviral treatments. The discovery could lead to a new method for dealing with viral reservoirs, which have proven to be one of the biggest hurdles to developing HIV cures and vaccines. These reservoirs contain latent HIV-infected cells that can reawaken at any time, making it impossible to eradicate the virus for good. The treatment was reported by a letter to the Annals of Oncology.
See-"Drastic decrease of the HIV reservoir in a patient treated with nivolumab for lung cancer"- A Guihot A -G Marcelin M -A Massiani A Samri C Soulié B Autran J -P Spano.- Annals of Oncology, mdx696, https://doi.org/10.1093/annonc/mdx696
Published: 01 December 2017.
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