For the first time, a patient with HIV has recovered
A New Yorker woman was able to recover from HIV with a stem cell transplant and a cord blood transfusion.
The woman has become the fourth patient in the world who managed to defeat the virus, according to the article published in the Wall Street Journal, but some researchers are skeptical of this statement.
Doctors said the woman has not shown any signs of the virus on extensive testing since she stopped antiretroviral therapy after receiving a stem cell transplant with a rare genetic mutation that prevents HIV invasion.
In 2013, she was diagnosed with HIV. Four years later, she was diagnosed with leukemia. In a procedure known as a haploid umbilical cord transplantation, she received umbilical cord blood from a partially identical donor for the treatment of cancer. A close relative also gave her blood transfusions to strengthen her immune system when she underwent the transplant.
After cord blood, the patient was injected with additional adult stem cells.
“We estimate that about 50 patients per year in the United States could benefit from this procedure,” said Dr. Koen van Beesian, one of the physicians involved in the treatment.
Since the transplant was performed in August 2017, the woman has been in recovery from leukemia. Three years after the transplant, she and her doctors stopped HIV treatment.
The “Berlin patient”, the American Timothy Ray Brown and the “London patient” Adam Castillejo underwent a bone marrow transplant to treat leukemia. According to some reports, the third person to be cured of HIV was a 36-year-old man from Brazil, nicknamed the “São Paulo Patient”.
