A third person and the first
woman is now cured of HIV.
It's exciting and hopeful
news for several communities.
But what does that really mean
for people living with HIV?
Right now we're bringing in UC
San Diego health decision Doctor
Sheldon Morris on the floor today.
Thank you for joining us.
Doctor Morris.
First question,
what does this mean for people
living with HIV right now?
Yeah, thanks for having us.
Well for the people that have HIV
now which is like over a million
people in the US that have HIV
or living with HIV we have many
millions more across the world.
You know this is just a hint that we're
making some progress towards HIV cure.
Now, when it comes to HIV,
obviously this has been a
topic in several communities.
Communities of color in the LGBTQIA
community for a long time as well.
What should those folks take
away from this progress that
we're talking about here?
OK, well you know there's two things
that are really interesting about this.
This case of cure in this cisgender woman
is that First off is it's a little bit
different methodology than we've seen before.
It's a very unique case though.
It's people that have HIV develop a
a cancer that needs a bone marrow
transplant and they get a transplant
with a replacement bone marrow or stem
cells that don't have the receptor
for the HIV to attach to.
So therefore they're they're they're.
They're essentially cured once
that bone marrow takes over,
but it's not a simple process that everyone
can get because this takes a lot of impact.
It's happened to a number of people,
and they just don't even
survive their cancer,
so it's only really that unique group then,
and they'll be other types of cure
approaches to different people.
So in the in the future,
and that's what we're working
on it like at at UCSD,
we have the antiviral Research
Center where that I'm affiliated
with that we're working on on
different types of true strategies.
The second thing that's quite interesting
is that you know this is a mixed race,
since tender woman and that really
speaks to the sort of equity of treatment
and prevention for HIV across gender,
sexual orientation, race,
ethnicity, and age.
Those are all things that we're really
committed to and, and so it's it's.
It's refreshing to see.
That that is also happening at
this cure level.
Sure, Doctor Morris, of course,
as I mentioned, as you're talking about,
we've been looking at HIV for a long time,
and in this case we're using
the buzzword curing HIV.
But what does that really mean in
this instance where we are right now?
Well, it it it.
It does probably mean that they
no longer are infected cousin.
All that we have many ways
to try and detect HIV.
And very you know, microscopic
amounts within the cells that it harbors.
The problem with HIV is that HIV
hides in cells in our body even when
they're on full antiretroviral therapy,
which suppresses the virus.
And people have very normal life
expectancies with oral enteral therapy,
but they have to take it for their life so.
Did they issue is that we can
we need to be able to find those
cells that are that with HIV is
hiding and be able to detect them.
So we need to find different mechanisms
to get to those cells and get rid of them.
So in this case you know when they've
had all of the what it does tell
us is that if you get rid of the
blood containing cells or the blood,
the cells that that generate the blood
that seems to take the HIV with it.
So when you replace it,
that seems to that's a good thing then.
That means out there that there is
some compartment that we can target
with our therapeutic approaches.
Alright, Doctor Morris,
delving into the progress at
news of a cure to HIV here just
getting to the surface of it.
We've got a lot more to talk about and
for that we will go to our website and
you can obviously read our stories on that.
Doctor Morris.
Thank you for joining us
here on the floor today.
Yeah, have a great day.