Mechanism found associated with stem cell transplant might help eradicate HIV virus

Spanish scientists working jointly for the IrsiCaixa AIDS Research Institute in Barcelona and the Gregorio Maranon Hospital in Madrid have pointed out that certain mechanisms associated with stem cell transplants might help eliminate the HIV virus from patients.

In the latest report published by IrisCaixa this week, the investigators based their conclusion on evidence that the HIV virus (which causes AIDS) was eliminated from the blood and tissue of six patients after they underwent a treatment involving the transplant of stem cells.

The IrsiCaixa AIDS Research Institute is a non-profit biomedical investigative organization which has been working since 1995 in order to find a cure for AIDS.

"Certain mechanisms associated with stem cell transplant that might contribute to HIV reservoir eradication, after 5 patients who received a stem cell transplant have undetectable HIV reservoir and HIV antibodies are no longer found in one of them," confirmed the organization on its official website, adding that the findings could "serve for the design of less-invasive HIV cure strategies."

The institute believed this could be another step forward in the search to find a cure for AIDS and explained that the next stage will be "performing a clinical trial that combines new immunotherapies with medically supervised removal of antiretroviral drugs in some of these patients, in order to know if there is viral rebound and confirm whether the virus has been eradicated from their bodies."