CRISPR cure for HIV now tested in 3 people
freethink.com
freethink.com
This article being written kinda bothers me? By the authors own admission we know almost nothing. We really just know it's safe but don't even know if anyone stopped taking their ART.
Sure it's great that we are not getting a setback from it being unsafe... but I am just tired of hearing about the false starts that time and time again turn out ineffective.
Like I said maybe I am just jaded here but something about this rubs me the wrong way.
I should be clear that I am happy that the research is being done, its just this article isn't (unless I missed it) isn't even a PR piece for the company doing it? A company putting out the actual PR is perfectly valid and I think a standard practice.
Lots of 'cure' mentions while admitting the treatment is not a cure. Trials run with ambigious results, and Excision is protecting the data until 2024.
Honestly not sure if I read an article at all. It reads like a 'keep alive' ping from an old space probe reporting back it's still alive status.
We've seen blood cancer patients cured of HIV after getting a bone marrow transplant, where the stem cells in their own bone marrow are wiped out before being replaced with stem cells from a healthy donor, but that's a little too extreme a procedure for widespread use.
> A man dubbed the 'Geneva patient' appears to be the latest person cured of HIV after a stem cell transplant for cancer treatment. Unlike the other five known cases, however, he received stem cells from a donor who does not have a rare mutation that prevents HIV from entering cells. The man continues to have undetectable HIV 20 months after stopping antiretroviral therapy (ART).
https://www.aidsmap.com/news/jul-2023/first-person-may-be-cu...
Mostly the focus has been on developing a vaccine for prevention, and treatments that suppress the disease in the already infected.
This is the first safety trial I'm aware of where a strategy that could at least theoretically succeed in curing the already infected has been tried.
If you’re dog and ponying your new treatment, and the best you can say is “the side effects resolved on their own,” you have to assume the efficacy was disappointing.
> Researchers conduct clinical trials in a series of steps called phases.
Phase I trials: Researchers test a medicine or other treatment in a small group of people for the first time. The purpose is to learn about the best dosage for a medicine or other treatment and to learn about the safety and side effects.
Phase II trials: Researchers study the new medicine or treatment in a larger group of people to determine its effectiveness and to further study its safety.
Phase III trials: Researchers give the new medicine or treatment to an even larger group of participants to confirm its effectiveness, monitor side effects, compare it with standard or similar treatments or a placebo , and collect information that will allow the new medicine or treatment to be used safely.
Phase IV trials: After the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approves a medicine or treatment and it is made available to the public, researchers track its safety in the general population, seeking more information about the medicine or treatment’s benefits and optimal use.
It would have been great if the treatment had clinical efficacy at even the safety dosing level, but it's also not especially disappointing that it didn't.