News
Cord blood transplant cures AIDS
27 Marzo 2023
In 1996, it was reported that 1% of the Caucasian race population is affected with mutation of CCR gene and that makes these individuals resistant to HIV infection, It was hypothesized that transplantation of hematopoietic stem cells from donors with this mutation to HIV positive patients would cure them.
In 2008, at the conference in Boston the world’s first patient in long-term virological remission was announced. This was Thimoty Ray Brown, more known to the world as Berlin patient. He received hematopoietic stem cell transplant because of leukemia but cells originated from a donor with a "delta32" mutation on the CCR5 receptor and this allowed also to eliminate HIV from his organism. Berlin patient, died in 2020 because of leukemia.
During the next 15 years 4 more patients in HIV remission treated according to the above described protocol have been reported, they were London patient (2019), the City of Hope and New York patients (2022) and Dusseldorf patient (2023).
The third patient cured of HIV was a woman of mixed race and she was transplanted umbilical cord blood stem cells. This patient was diagnosed HIV in 2013 and was indicated hematopoietic stem cell transplant because of acute myelogenous leukemia. She received 2 samples of the cord blood, one from a donor with a mutation on the CCR5 receptor and another originated from her relative. The patient opted to discontinue antiretroviral therapy 37 months after the transplant. More than 14 months later, she now shows no signs of HIV in blood tests, and does not seem to have detectable antibodies to the virus. This opens up the possibility of curing more people of diverse racial background using cord blood as a source of stem cells.
February 2023, the fifth patient confirmed cured of HIV was announced. This was a 53-year-old man from Germany. Although the details of his successful treatment were first announced at a conference in 2019, researchers could not confirm he had been officially cured at that time. The so called Dusseldorf patient has stopped his HIV medication four years ago.