AIDS Cure Found?

Hmm, I don't know this seems sketchy. Maybe because I feel the lack of information/resources?
 
I personally can't wait for the backlash this will receive both from religious zealots and the scientific community alike. I DEMAND more data, repeatability and etc. I am so sick of the media flipping out about this stuff and even madder at the researchers for making a press release of it. As it stands, I consider this a one-of or at best a misrepresentation of data.

If this is legit, I am personally VERY excited to see what Deck Knight (and his kindred Republican, Christian, anti-abortion and anti-stem cell friends) have to say about things now, simply to see the unwaivering moral line once again be ruined by progress. I want to know who has more rights: a fetus or a person who is cognitively able to look someone in the eye and say "Please don't let me die when there is a viable cure out there". It'll be a wonderful discussion :D.

Subsequently, University of Alberta found a similar "break through (and here too)" for HIV at one point that appears to have fizzled into nothingness. Don't hold your breath, lets play the wait and see game.

This reminds me of the arsenic metabolizing bacteria that everyone lost their minds over. Turns out it was sensationalized...the salt they used in a lab contained phosphorus in greater quantities than found in the Sargasso Sea where bacteria can still functionally metabolize. Go look up the backlash there and see the similarities and exactly what happens when you jump the gun.
 

ΩDonut

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Bullshit.

The treatment they advocate as a "cure" does absolutely nothing to solve the big underlying problem - that HIV mutates so rapidly within a person that the immune system or drugs can't target all the possible mutants that pop up at once. A stem cell transplant isn't going to change that, even if the stem cells are HIV-resistant, because odds are there's a mutant out there it won't resist.


EDIT: Hmm. Okay, I need to think about the mechanics of the infection a bit.

I didn't know there was a second type HIV virus, one that usually appears late in infections. The stem cells this guy received would have been vulnerable to those, but I guess this guy didn't have them.

If this really does work, that would mean that as long as you didn't have any of the late-infection viruses, you could be cured after a regimen of chemotherapy and some HIV-resistant stem cells. At least the mechanics are sound, in theory. And as far as I can tell, they did their homework pretty well, in contrast with the sloppy labwork of the scientists who made the arsenic bacteria discovery.
 
Like I said though, OD, it's one case and nothing to lose your mind about yet. Not to mention we're talking about a retrovirus...RNA based viruses. RNA is notoriously less stable that DNA which facilitates an outrageous mutation rate, meaning evolution happens VERY rapidly. Regular viruses (Ie Rhinovirus, influenze) are exceptionally hard to cure, hence why we have a new flu vaccine every year. Retroviruses are pretty hard little fuckers to pin down. If you're really keen, I suggest wikipedia searching RNA, Retrovirus, HIV and etc. :D

I'm skeptical that they did their homework. I think they are abusing this possible coincidental or misread finding to hijack more funding, which is ultimately a great thing for AIDS research in general. That is, after all, what it's all about. I can honestly tell you that when you are looking for something, you're far more likely to find it even if it's not there. I've been guilty of that in research I've done, I needed a kick to the ego before I realized I was being hasty and speculative. So of course something like this is a "breakthrough", it's exactly what they are looking for on two different fronts even if it's basically a shadow puppet.
 
If this is legit, I am personally VERY excited to see what Deck Knight (and his kindred Republican, Christian, anti-abortion and anti-stem cell friends) have to say about things now, simply to see the unwaivering moral line once again be ruined by progress. I want to know who has more rights: a fetus or a person who is cognitively able to look someone in the eye and say "Please don't let me die when there is a viable cure out there". It'll be a wonderful discussion :D.
Before you get too happy with yourself, remember that stem cells != embryonic stem cells.

In fact, from what I can tell, the stem cells in question were from adult bone marrow. Don't quote me on that one, though, as it's been hard to find information about CCR532/32 stem cells that isn't actually talking about this.

Anyone here have specific knowledge on this subject?
 
Petrie I am fully aware of that. However, a victory for one stem cell is a victory for all stem cells. If progress like this is made this quickly with the "less potent" adult cells, it's likely all stem cell research will meet less resistance in the future simply to see the potential. Either way, the elegance and potency of stem cells shouldn't need to be highlighted to anyone. It'd be rad if we could just use adult cells for anything, and this may well turn out to be a fine example of that, so that instead of changing minds we can simply just ignore them.
 
Embryonic stem cells taken from 5 day old blastocytes are used purely because they have more elasticity than adult stem cells which means they can differentiate into a much larger range of potential cells than that taken from adult bone marrow so therefore are much more useful.

I don't see any mention in either of the articles toward embryonic stell cells.
 
The thing is, this is just one man who has supposedly been cured of AIDS. While the mechanism of the cure for this man seems reasonable, there are definitely some things to keep in mind before we do a huge victory dance:

-Is this treatment as safe and effective for other people as it was for this man? What are the risks? How effective is it, really? Only through extensive clinical trials can this be determined.

-The cure was a stem cell transplant. Transplants have to come from donors. Donors have to be genetically similar enough to the recipients that the stem cells aren't rejected by the recipients' immune systems.

-Finding enough donors that lack the CCR5 receptors on CD4 cells that match recipients is not exactly a walk in the park. This should mean a lot of difficulty for starting clinical trials in humans (if it even gets that far, which it could, because it looks promising enough), and even if it's approved, well, good luck getting enough donors to treat a significant amount of patients, particularly those in extremely poor African nations who can barely afford anti-retrovirals (and in the vast majority of cases can't afford them and can't access them even if they can afford them)

tl;dr We've still got a long way to go before AIDS stops being a problem.
 

ΩDonut

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-The cure was a stem cell transplant. Transplants have to come from donors. Donors have to be genetically similar enough to the recipients that the stem cells aren't rejected by the recipients' immune systems.
Yeah, the guy was on immunosuppressant drugs. The article says the chemotherapy he was on for his leukemia might have helped kill off the HIV-infected immune cells, too.

-Finding enough donors that lack the CCR5 receptors on CD4 cells that match recipients is not exactly a walk in the park. This should mean a lot of difficulty for starting clinical trials in humans (if it even gets that far, which it could, because it looks promising enough), and even if it's approved, well, good luck getting enough donors to treat a significant amount of patients, particularly those in extremely poor African nations who can barely afford anti-retrovirals (and in the vast majority of cases can't afford them and can't access them even if they can afford them)
No kidding. I think that's why that's why the first article specifically mentions genetically-engineered stem cells, probably based off the CCR5-less CD4 cells and modified to match the patient's HLA type, to avoid rejection by the immune system.
 
Yeah, the guy was on immunosuppressant drugs. The article says the chemotherapy he was on for his leukemia might have helped kill off the HIV-infected immune cells, too.
Preeettttyyy sure all transplant patients have to go on immunosuppressant drugs at first, even if they're well-matched. There's always a risk of rejection, and it's best to reduce this by both serotype matching and putting the patients on immunosuppressants.

EDIT: Also, the better the match, the lower the dose of immunosuppressants the patient will probably need, and the less time the patient will probably have to stay on the drugs. Let's not forget the bad part of immunosuppressants: they also make you way more susceptible to infection, and the infections are generally more severe. That's why in a vaccine shortage, the HIV patients and the patients on immunosuppressants are given the vaccines first.

OmegaDonut said:
No kidding. I think that's why that's why the first article specifically mentions genetically-engineered stem cells, probably based off the CCR5-less CD4 cells and modified to match the patient's HLA type.
No, the actual stem cells used on the patient came from a donor. Read it again.

It says that in the future, genetically engineering the stem cells will probably be the way to go, but they haven't actually done it yet:
aidsmap.com said:
Several US research groups announced in October 2009 that they had received funding to explore techniques for engineering and introducing CCR5-deficient stem cells.
If these approaches prove successful they will be expensive, so in the early stages it is likely that they would be reserved for people with no remaining treatment options or a cancer requiring bone marrow or stem cell transfer.
Translation: it might be done years from now, but even if it works, it'll be painful, expensive, and difficult to access at first.
 
Preeettttyyy sure all transplant patients have to go on immunosuppressant drugs at first
I think they key to it was actually Chemo.

It says that in the future, genetically engineering the stem cells will probably be the way to go, but they haven't actually done it yet
Did you hear about the cell that was hijacked? They removed its genome and put in a synthetic one and sure enough, it actually reproduced and survived. That is not a far cry from basically taking a simple stem cell and doing the exact same thing.
 
I think they key to it was actually Chemo.
The key to what? The key to the AIDS cure was the transplant of the AIDS-resistant stem cells; they were actually from the donor's bone marrow.
The chemo was used to treat the cancer (remove all cancerous cells and make room for the new bone marrow to grow and be happy; consequently, this was also part of the AIDS cure since it was essential for the successful transplant, but it wasn't the key to it).
The immunosuppressants were used to reduce the risk of graft-versus-host disease.

This is also probably a good time to point out that bone marrow transplants are not for the faint of heart. Check out this medline plus article: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/003009.htm
The risks are not pretty, and it's rather painful.

Did you hear about the cell that was hijacked? They removed its genome and put in a synthetic one and sure enough, it actually reproduced and survived. That is not a far cry from basically taking a simple stem cell and doing the exact same thing.
No, but regardless, you're oversimplifying. For this to work, you'd have to selectively modify parts of the human genome, whereas most splicing and genetic engineering is done on far less complex organisms like bacteria to my knowledge. I mean, they're experimenting with modifying the human genome now, but the techniques are far from perfect, hence the funding received for researching these techniques-- allow me to requote the same part of the article I quoted earlier:
aidsmap.com said:
Several US research groups announced in October 2009 that they had received funding to explore techniques for engineering and introducing CCR5-deficient stem cells.
Also, even if the technique for introducing these genes were perfect, you'd have to keep redoing it for each person needing the therapy, which would take time and money (at least right now). And yeah, the regimen of chemo, bone marrow transplant, and immunosuppressants isn't exactly the most painless regimen on the planet, nor is it the least expensive.
 
I don't have the expertise in the subject, but my understanding is that the chemotherapy actually was an important factor in effectively curing the patient of HIV.

Basically, due to the patient's leukemia, bone marrow transplant and chemotherapy was required in order to treat the disease. First, they perform the chemotherapy to destroy most/all of the bone marrow producing the infected white blood cells. In doing this, obviously the chemotherapy can't differentiate between the *infected* bone marrow and the *normal* bone marrow, and thus destroys it both. After the chemo, the patient received the transplant of the donator's bone marrow, which produced CD4 cells that are "immune" to HIV because they lack the binding mechanism the virus attaches to. Essentially, the virus can't attack these new CD4 cells because it can't bind to them. This is a normal genetic mutation in European populations that is thought to be connected to black plague survivors.

Because of the chemotherapy, no CD4 cells with the CCR5 receptor (AKA, CD4 cells created by the patient's original marrow) were being created, or the number was very small and negligible compared to the "new" CD4 cells without the receptor. Thus, the virus had no source of "food" to multiply, and was either eradicated from his body or is still present with no symptoms. Presumably, the article claims they were unable to find any trace of the HIV cells in his body, indicating the virus was fully eradicated.

However, we shouldn't get too hopeful for this "cure". Especially with the dangers associated with bone marrow transplant and chemotherapy in general. HIV is manageable with medications, and even in the worst cases is preferable to full-on chemotherapy. Its applications would be basically limited to patients with diseases such as leukemia or other immune deficiency diseases.

On the topic of stem cells, it is possible to "de-differentiate" normal cells into stem cells, though the risks of cancer forming at the moment are far too high for the technology to be utilized effectively at the moment. Still, only a few years from now these might prove to be as efficient as embryonic stem cells and will hopefully make the latter obsolete.
 
While it might lead to bigger and better cures, right now it's pretty damn impractical. The chemotherapy essentially destroyed most of his immune cells, and he required a bone marrow transplant from a donor that had immune (resistant?) cells. Plus, we don't have definitive proof that the virus disappeared completely (we'll learn more as data comes in and times passes).

Still, this is still a pretty damn impressive feat. Hopefully more practical ways will trickle down.
 
It was the key to creating a virus unfriendly environment, Lanturn.

Educate yourself on just what genetics has accomplished and you can freely speculate on where that will take us.
 

tape

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A bit off-topic but I've always wondered; why is religion against stem-cell research?

Also after the fucking arsenic-bacteria shit I've decided to hold on tight until it's proven thoroughly.

edit: ok what the fuck Venter created life?
well fine not in the FULL SENSE but...

edit2: oh man DK post get hype

edit3: godwin's lol
 

Deck Knight

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Petrie I am fully aware of that. However, a victory for one stem cell is a victory for all stem cells. If progress like this is made this quickly with the "less potent" adult cells, it's likely all stem cell research will meet less resistance in the future simply to see the potential. Either way, the elegance and potency of stem cells shouldn't need to be highlighted to anyone. It'd be rad if we could just use adult cells for anything, and this may well turn out to be a fine example of that, so that instead of changing minds we can simply just ignore them.
The two different kinds of stem cells are handled entirely differently from a bioethical perspective, not that you appear willing to entertain such differences as long as the right people are annoyed apparently. Embryonic stem cells have up to this point been all hype and no results. They basically had people fertilize and destroy a bunch on human embryos on the theory that a wild, unstable stallion is going to be a better racehorse than one that has some formative experience and training. At this point embyonic stem cells are best known for being a political pet project funded with public dollars primarily to offend religious sensibilities regarding the purposeful fabrication and destruction of human life rather than a worthwhile medical endeavor in itself.

If you'd get out of your childish mental lock that science and religion are opposed, maybe you'd have something valuable to contribute instead of your trite, pathetic attempts at trolling. But no, expecting you to be happy they have found a prospective cure for HIV instead of assaulting religious people would be setting the bar too high I guess. Bioethics exist for a reason, and it's to prevent the excesses of sadism masked as science. Take your pick of Mengele or "human tolerances research" conducted by certain 20th century regimes supportive of eugenics. Then do as you will. "For Science" is just as bad as "For God," and infinitely more popular these days as an excuse for barbarity.

btw. Morm my grandfather had AML and died from complications with his weakned immune system, pneumonia, etc this year. Thanks for showing your standard issue compassion, temperance, and reason in dealing with issues like this instead of flying off the handle.

In the meantime, welcome back.
 
It was the key to creating a virus unfriendly environment, Lanturn.

Educate yourself on just what genetics has accomplished and you can freely speculate on where that will take us.
You know, I understood what you were talking about before you linked to that article, but that's OK. The thing is, I'm not doubting that they'll probably be able to engineer the human stem cells to express the proper genes eventually; all I said was that they haven't done it yet. And even if they're successful, there's still a lot of room for healthy skepticism as to whether this will actually become a good, viable, widespread treatment for AIDS.

Deck Knight said:
Embryonic stem cells have up to this point been all hype and no results. They basically had people fertilize and destroy a bunch on human embryos on the theory that a wild, unstable stallion is going to be a better racehorse than one that has some formative experience and training. At this point embyonic stem cells are best known for being a political pet project funded with public dollars primarily to offend religious sensibilities regarding the purposeful fabrication and destruction of human life rather than a worthwhile medical endeavor in itself.
Well, it's hard to say whether the lack of success is because embryonic stem cells aren't useful or if it's because we don't know enough about embryonic stem cells yet to know what to do with them. And as for people going out and fertilizing fetuses just for research, I don't know how true that is, but it doesn't sound very realistic, since there are tons of fetuses just laying around in fertility clinics that will never actually develop into fully-fledged humans. You see, in fertility clinics, a lot more eggs are fertilized than needed to create a viable fetus, so a lot of viable fetuses are created, yet only one or two end up being chosen to continue gestation.The rest are simply discarded, even though they could easily be put to use in stem cell research, just because the right wing is against such research. And the purpose behind doing research on them would be to find cures for diseases, not "offend religious sensibilities"-- that would just be an unfortunate byproduct. I dunno, I think we're just going to disagree on this no matter what. But since, as you pointed out, the two different types of stem cells have completely different implications in terms of bioethics, I suppose that this is a discussion for another topic, as it's the less-controversial kind that's currently being discussed as a "cure" for AIDS.

Also, I'm sorry for your loss.
 

Deck Knight

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Well, it's hard to say whether the lack of success is because embryonic stem cells aren't useful or if it's because we don't know enough about embryonic stem cells yet to know what to do with them. And as for people going out and fertilizing fetuses just for research, I don't know how true that is, but it doesn't sound very realistic, since there are tons of fetuses just laying around in fertility clinics that will never actually develop into fully-fledged humans. You see, in fertility clinics, a lot more eggs are fertilized than needed to create a viable fetus, so a lot of viable fetuses are created, yet only one or two end up being chosen to continue gestation.The rest are simply discarded, even though they could easily be put to use in stem cell research, just because the right wing is against such research. And the purpose behind doing research on them would be to find cures for diseases, not "offend religious sensibilities"-- that would just be an unfortunate byproduct. I dunno, I think we're just going to disagree on this no matter what. But since, as you pointed out, the two different types of stem cells have completely different implications in terms of bioethics, I suppose that this is a discussion for another topic, as it's the less-controversial kind that's currently being discussed as a "cure" for AIDS.

Also, I'm sorry for your loss.
The debate on stem cell research was on government funding, not on the research itself. While the Catholic Church doesn't support the research on the grounds it requires the destruction of human life, there have been no initiatives as far as I'm aware to ban it from being researched by private firms. That reality doesn't sell newspapers though so instead it was reported as if public funding for the research was the same as the research itself.

If I recall my information correctly there were generally two "lines" up for discussion in the embryonic stem cell research debate. One was as you said the leftovers of fertility clinics who create more embryos than they need purposefully in order to have a better chance of a successful conception. The other line was going to be created anew for the express purpose of conducting the research rather than as a byproduct of fertility clinics.

(Side note: The Catholic Church also morally opposes in-vitro fertilization because of the method the clinics use which requires creating embryos with the knowledge that some or all will not survive by design. The church does not view having children as an entitlement to adults and believes that life begins at the moment of conception, ipso facto in-vitro fertilization's very process ensures multiple conceptions with the knowledge that not all will make it beforehand.)

One last thing: the Catholic Church is not equivalent to "the right wing." Sometimes I wish it were, just like I wish more Catholics actually learned about their faith instead of treating it like a social identity. A large portion of the movement against federal funding was spearheaded by Protestant and Mormon groups as well. As far as internal "right-wing" support of the federal funding, you generally had your more secular libertarian fiscal conservatives who are swayed by arguments about "legislating morality (unless its weed or fornication being targeted)" as well as cocktail party Rockefeller bluebloods who like low taxes and a muscular defense policy, but I digress.
 
The two different kinds of stem cells are handled entirely differently from a bioethical perspective, not that you appear willing to entertain such differences as long as the right people are annoyed apparently.
Naw, it has nothing to do with Christians being annoyed, that's just a nice side effect. To me, a stem cell is a stem cell no matter how it's harvested since I'm pro choice and pro progress.

Embryonic stem cells have up to this point been all hype and no results.
Maybe if people would stop crying and give them appropriate funding or stop trying to ban them. It's like saying "the mission to mars has been all hype and no results" before anything can even be organized! We are still in our infancy with this shit man, kinda quick to be making such black and white claims I'd say.

If you'd get out of your childish mental lock that science and religion are opposed, maybe you'd have something valuable to contribute instead of your trite, pathetic attempts at trolling.
one is progressive, the other has a rich history of impeding progress. I see a problem right there. I was excited to talk about this publicly with you, not trolling you. It wasn't a challenge or anything.


But no, expecting you to be happy they have found a prospective cure for HIV instead of assaulting religious people would be setting the bar too high I guess.
Read my posts, a little early to be calling it even a prospective cure. It's likely a one of, if I'm wrong I'll be happy for the WHOLE universe.


Bioethics exist for a reason, and it's to prevent the excesses of sadism masked as science.
Curse you, EUGENICS! Technically it's right but morally it's wrong, go figure.

Then do as you will. "For Science" is just as bad as "For God," and infinitely more popular these days as an excuse for barbarity.
I don't think speaking from your standpoint you have any reason to be calling science barbarism; when the scientific method is TRULY applied (not just some moron pleading to science), even the most heinous of crimes can be salvaged as useful. It's like that old rhetoric about the medical testing on the jews in WW2- yes atrocious, but now that it's done to NOT use it would be absolutely retarded. Science unleashed would end up more like Rapture from Bioshock 2, so checks and balances are needed.

btw. Morm my grandfather had AML and died from complications with his weakned immune system, pneumonia, etc this year. Thanks for showing your standard issue compassion, temperance, and reason in dealing with issues like this instead of flying off the handle.
Irrelevant. You are now pleading to my sympathies? It has zero bearing on the discussion; Your feelings are not an acceptable alternative to empirical evidence in a discussion such as this, nor should they be used to try to manipulate or insult. Sorry that your grandfather died...that's all I can really say, I'm bad with stuff like that as you can probably guess.

In the meantime, welcome back.
Glad you're still around :D. I'd ask how things are...but yeah.

Edit: Lanturn, I had a feeling you did but I wanted to provide the link anyways as spoonfeeding people on the internet is better than arm waving, it's the default I guess.

Edit2: I don't mean to hurt your feelings deck, honestly, I am just horrendously bad at communicating anything but scorn on the net. Don't take it the wrong way, please.
 

Chou Toshio

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What I don't get is how stem cells can cure someone of a viral infection.

Hadn't the virus already immersed itself within cells throughout the man's body? How does adding more cells in a specific area fix the infections throughout the body? That makes no sense to me.
 

jrrrrrrr

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Stem Cell treatments apparently proving themselves further, with the biggest medical breakthrough in recent history.
As great as all of this is, your headline is extremely misleading. They didn't find a cure for AIDS. They cured one person of AIDS using an extremely expensive and (at this time) unreliable method that involves stem cells. This hasn't been repeated, reviewed or studied nearly enough yet to declare it as a cure for AIDS. Don't get me wrong, this is an incredible story and a huge step in the right direction. But the battle isn't over yet.

The people in this topic denouncing the US' former position on stem cell research are only partially right. Only federal funding was cut off. Even though that is pretty much a death sentence for researching cures (since in modern times treating symptoms is more profitable for the private sector), stem cell research just became taboo...it was never actually banned under Bush. In that time, our country has fallen behind even farther behind in science research which has basically guaranteed that countries like Germany will be the leaders in medicine and research for the next generation. But that's no reason to make things up.

But no, expecting you to be happy they have found a prospective cure for HIV instead of assaulting religious people would be setting the bar too high I guess. Bioethics exist for a reason, and it's to prevent the excesses of sadism masked as science. Take your pick of Mengele or "human tolerances research" conducted by certain 20th century regimes supportive of eugenics. Then do as you will. "For Science" is just as bad as "For God," and infinitely more popular these days as an excuse for barbarity
I agree with you until the last sentence. "For science" usually implies that you are going to perform experiments and submit your data for extensive peer review in order to objectively understand the world. "For God" usually implies that you are going to ignore evidence to support your baseless beliefs because they can't stand up to objective analysis by other people. Bioethics is an invaluable field, but using "god" as your bioethical compass is as much of a mistake as using nothing.
 
Jrrrr it's beyond unreliable, it's irresponsible to make a headline like this. It's why I compared it to the arsenic bacteria debaucle provided to us from NASA recently- it's unfounded and, if anything, a blip on the radar that has been blown out of proportion with grotesque assumptions based on assumptions.

Don't forget that "for science" typically involves advancement on thought, technology, discovery and general understanding of the universe. "For God" typically involves flying planes into buildings, social stagnation and systematic armwaving.
 

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