(Web Desk) - In a rare medical milestone, a German man has become only the seventh person in the 40-year history of AIDS epidemic to be completely cured of HIV.
The 60-year-old German, who wished to remain anonymous, recovered after receiving a stem transplant, the doctors announced on Thursday.
The man underwent the painful and risky procedure which is reserved only for those who have both HIV and acute myeloid leukemia, or AML. He received the stem cell transplant in October 2015 and stopped taking his antiretroviral drugs in September 2018.
Since then, he remains in viral remission with no rebound as confirmed by multiple ultra-sensitive tests that detected no viable HIV in his body.
“A healthy person has many wishes, a sick person only one," the man reflected on his HIV-free status.
The findings of the case are expected to be presented at the 25th International AIDS Conference in Munich by Dr. Christian Gaebler, a physician-scientist at the Charité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin.
“The longer we see these HIV remissions without any HIV therapy, the more confidence we can get that we’re probably seeing a case where we really have eradicated all competent HIV,” said Gaebler.
Gaebler, however, had tempered the expectation saying "the patient's case is highly suggestive of an HIV cure". The treatment given to the German patient is not available to nearly 40 million people living with the deadly virus across the world.
THE FIRST PATIENT TO BE CURED
Timothy Ray Brown, nicknamed the 'Berlin Patient' was the first person to be declared HIV-free back in 2008. Brown was diagnosed positive in 1995 while attending university.
Akin to the seventh patient, Brown also had leukaemia and received a stem cell transplant in 2007 after which HIV was no longer found in his blood. Brown died from cancer in 2020.
BREAKTHROUGH TRIAL
Earlier this month, a breakthrough clinical trial conducted in South Africa and Uganda claimed that biannual injection of a new pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) drug gives young women total protection from HIV infection.
As many as 5,000 participants were enrolled for the study, sponsored by Gilead Sciences, at three sites in Uganda and 25 sites in South Africa to test the efficacy of Lenacapavir and two other drugs.
During the randomised trial, none of the 2,314 women who received the injection of Lenacapavir contracted HIV, which suggested the efficacy was 100 per cent.