Two patients appear to have beaten HIV, offering hope for cure

A 66-year-old man in Southern California and a woman in her 70s in Spain are the latest in a small group of people who appear to have beaten their HIV infections, providing researchers new clues to a possible cure at a time when Covid-19 and other crises are slowing progress against the spreading virus.

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Doctors caring for the man said they haven’t found any human immunodeficiency virus that can replicate in his body since he stopped antiretroviral drug therapy in March 2021 after a transplant of stem cells containing a rare genetic mutation that blocks HIV infection. He was given the transplant for leukemia, for which people with HIV are at increased risk. Details of his case were made public Wednesday and will be presented at a large international AIDS conference in Montreal that opens Friday…

Years of research finally revealed how she keeps her HIV naturally under control, he said: she has high levels of two types of immune cells that the virus normally suppresses and that probably help control viral replication, he said. Details of her case will be presented at the same conference. Both patients declined to be identified publicly.

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