Setback in controlling HIV/AIDS

[TaraJo]

You have to take risks to make progress. I'm sure it was all done with the patients' full consent, so what's the problem here?

Not to mention, it had ben done before. Sort of.

The Berlin patient was a man who was HIV positive but he got a bone marrow transplant for an unrelated illness. After being on the standard coctail for HIV treatmnt, he stopped of his own free will and still isn't showing any signs of HIV infection.

And both of these two patients had also gotten a bone marrow transplant as well, so they were the best opportunity to test the theory. Sadly, it didn't pan out. It's theorized that the difference was that the bone marrow doner for the Berlin patient has a rare HIV resistant gene.

If I'm a researcher looking for answers, I'm going to be studying that gene, figuring out how it resists HIV and how we can duplicate it in others. Still, part of me worries that there won't be as much support for curing HIV when pharmicutical companies can make more money by treating HIV by keeping patients taking their medication for the rest of their lives.