No More Hiding for Virus Causing AIDS-HIV

In an effort to uncover the riddle that is AIDS-HIV, a team of Amearican and Canadian researchers may have discovered the hiding places for the virus.  It seems that it has been lurking in immune cells, allowing the virus to elude current drug treatments. With the new data, scientists may have new leads for innovative treatments for AIDS-HIV.

The American and Canadian researchers with Oregon State University’s Vaccine and Gene Therapy Institute (VGTI) of Florida and the University of Montreal, have found what they believe is a more effective treatment and potentially even cure for AIDS-HIV, based on the discovery of the virus’ hiding places. They have determined using a combination approach of targeted chemotherapy, along with highly active anti-retroviral (HAART) treatments, similar to treatments used to treat leukemia, may not only destroy the viruses circulating within the body, but may also destroy those hiding in the body’s immune system’s cells.

According to study co-leader Dr. Rafick-Pierre Sekaly, “You have to target not the virus, but the cells in which the virus is hiding. And that I think it is a very different concept than what everybody has been pushing for. That clearly is a major finding that we have got to the table.” He added, “This would make it possible to destroy cells containing a virus while giving the immune system time to regenerate with healthy cells.”

Researchers for the newly released study honed in on T-cells or immune cells for their research. T-cells respond to viruses based on vaccines the body has received. If a virus enters the body when a person has already been vaccinated against that particular virus then T-cells launch a very direct attack. However, the T-cells also seem to be the perfect place for HIV to hide out. Dr. Jean-Pierre Routy, an infection and immunity researcher at the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre in Montreal and a co-leader of the study said, “For the first time, this study proves that the HIV reservoirs are not due to a lack of potency of the antiretroviral drugs but to the virus hiding inside two different types of long-life CD4 memory immune cells.”

Research for more innovative treatments and cures for AIDS-HIV continue. Currently, drugs developed to treat the conditions have been able to keep AIDS-HIV to very low levels within the body, but they haven’t been able to eliminate the virus completely. Now, scientists have found their hiding places. A study to test the validity of the newly released study will start in September of this year. Dr. Sekaly says, he is “very optimistic” that researchers will be able to develop new drugs to target the hiding spots identified with their new research.

The study can be found online in the journal Nature Medicine.