AIDS cure?!?

[Killer-Kris]

I wonder if anyone has seen this yet.

http://www.wired.com/news/medtech/0,1286,63441,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_1

Sounds kind of cool, I sure hope it works. That and hopefully this technique can be used against other viruses... common cold anyone?

So is there anyone in here with some more background in this sort of thing? I was wondering how the article mentions that it needs to not kill of the virus immediatly in order to get the good virus spread, does it eventually activate and then kill the viruses? Or does it just make them benign, so that maybe sometime in the future everyone will be infected with HIV, but no one will ever see any symptoms or anything. Sorry if that was a dumb question, I have literally no knowledge in this area.

 

[Natoma]

I'd be pretty damn frightened about using that in the wild. Virii, even the most harmless and innocuous, have a nasty habit of mutating and cross breeding, becoming far more dangerous.

 

[Humus]

But does that make any difference? There are millions of viruses out there already, and they all have the ability to mutate and become very dangerous. Adding another virus would not increase that risk a lot, would it?

 

[Eronarn]

But does that make any difference? There are millions of viruses out there already, and they all have the ability to mutate and become very dangerous. Adding another virus would not increase that risk a lot, would it?

Sure it would. This is a virus that is similar to HIV, but people are told that it's completely safe.

Then in one person, it doesn't deactivate the HIV virus- it creates a new variant immune to the effects. He goes around having sex, because he's 'safe' from AIDS. And so is everyone else he had sex with- because remember, they caught the 'good' virus from him!

It would be a catastrophe.

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

They've been considering something like this for the last few years for a HIV vaccine. You make a vaccine out of a safe version of the virus, to give your immune system a heads up before it gets infected. This is how things like the smallpox and other immunisation work.

However everyone is too scared to do it, because the HIV virus is well known for its ability to mutate and jump the species barrier, and its very long gestation period. Researchers are afraid that they give everyone a vaccine that appears to work, and then ten years later, everyone starts getting (and dying from) an AIDS varient.

 

[jvd]

Cant they geneticly enhance our immune systems ? Or do other cool sci fi stuff yet.

 

[Killer-Kris]

What I'd be the most worried about is that something like this really does work, but we hold off on using it. Now maybe we might want to make sure that something life threatening like the AIDS vacine doesn't get used until properly tested.

But if manage to even wipe out the common cold using something similar I'd imagine the results would be fantastic. Let alone if we can even slow down killers like HIV, maleria, ebola, etc... it certainly would be on the same scale as the discovery of antibiotics.

I also think it's neat that they simulated the whole thing first, I just sure hope they did their simulations correctly. That's why I'm holding my breath on getting too excited.

 

[MfA]

Couldnt a total inhibition variant which doesnt multiply and propogate be used with periodic injections to inhibit HIV? Seems a lot safer.

 

[Guden Oden]

Kris,

Why would we want to wipe out the common cold virus? When was the last time you heard of someone dying from a cold? Try influenza instead, that'd be somewhat more worthwile... The flu is an absolute KILLER virus, it is also a cross-species strain and probably offs more people on a global basis than HIV does, and you won't get immune to it either due to it mutating left and right. Of course, due to its mutagenic properties, it would be hard to stop it...

Also, malaria is caused by a blood parasite and not a virus, so...

 

[Killer-Kris]

Kris,

Why would we want to wipe out the common cold virus? When was the last time you heard of someone dying from a cold? Try influenza instead, that'd be somewhat more worthwile... The flu is an absolute KILLER virus, it is also a cross-species strain and probably offs more people on a global basis than HIV does, and you won't get immune to it either due to it mutating left and right. Of course, due to its mutagenic properties, it would be hard to stop it...

Also, malaria is caused by a blood parasite and not a virus, so...

Well the common cold might not be a killer, but think about the millions (easily billions) of dollars lost to it each year from people missing work which costs companies money, and then from people going to the doctor to only be told it's a cold, as well as people buying over the counter remedies which help ease their suffering. It's also not just a monetary issue, I personally do not enjoy suffering, even if I know I'm not going to die, it's still not pleasant.

Yeah I just goofed about maleria, sorry about that. Where I am in the world is not heavily afflicted by this so I only ever hear about it in passing. So I guess that just shows I'm a wee bit ignorant on the topic in general.

But yeah about the flu, I'm assuming that's what influenza is... I didn't mean to leave any viruses out, just I was trying to make a point. People could argue I left out the hanta virus, influenza, polio, hepatitis, ad infinitum. I didn't mean any disrespect to those affected by them, just tried to keep my list to what was on the top of my head. Hopefully this technique can and will be applied to all of them.

Personally I think this is a great time to be alive as far as medical advancements go. I keep hearing about prospective cures for all sorts of things, the one I have the most interest in personally are the treatments currently in testing for alzheimers since I am very likely to have a genetic predisposition for it, that and hopefully it gets oked before my parents get much worse. But a virus equivalent to antibiotics would be absolutely amazing in my mind. I just hope it works...

 

[Eronarn]

You fool, you left out the flesheating virus!

 

[Guden Oden]

Hanta and ebola, while devastating when they strike, are both pretty rare. If they had the ease to spread around that the flu has or the common cold for that matter, we'd be pretty much screwed. Civilization as we know it would come crashing down.

Problem of stopping a virus with a virus is if the virus will STAY stopped, especially with something like the flu. It "breeds" in south east asia amongst pigs and chickens and stuff like that, then hops over to humans and makes a pass across the globe with travelling people before petering out. The virus changes constantly, and because it isn't dependent on humans to carry it on means we can't eradicate it by immunizing ourselves to it. It would just stay amongst the animal hosts until it has changed sufficiently to again get past our defenses.

 

[Killer-Kris]

Problem of stopping a virus with a virus is if the virus will STAY stopped, especially with something like the flu. It "breeds" in south east asia amongst pigs and chickens and stuff like that, then hops over to humans and makes a pass across the globe with travelling people before petering out. The virus changes constantly, and because it isn't dependent on humans to carry it on means we can't eradicate it by immunizing ourselves to it. It would just stay amongst the animal hosts until it has changed sufficiently to again get past our defenses.

Well who's to say we couldn't apply this to the animal viruses as well? Now of course I understand I'm certainly getting a bit over optimistic here, it's one thing for people to want to spend money on immunizing or curing themselves, but I certainly can't think of many people who would care to spend any substantial amount of money on a program of this sort of scale.

So yeah in this regard you're certainly right, there will never be an end to viruses affecting us humans. Though this could of course be a blessing in disguise. I'd imagine that the pharmaceuticals companies would be mighty pissed if we managed to wipe out viruses. So this way we can hopefully eradicate the most dangerous of the group, and leave a regular supply for the pharmaceuticals companies to continue making cures for and money off of. Other wise I'd be afraid that they might try and buy any patents to such a cure and then just refuse to produce it, but then of course we're going into the realm of conspiracy theories.

 

[Killer-Kris]

Edit: I wish I knew what was happening, but I've had several double posts happen a while after I initially posted. Oh well, once again sorry for the post. Anyone know how to delete a post?

 

[Natoma]

Hanta and ebola, while devastating when they strike, are both pretty rare. If they had the ease to spread around that the flu has or the common cold for that matter, we'd be pretty much screwed. Civilization as we know it would come crashing down.

They're rare only because they kill their host so quickly. Unfortunately with the speed of air travel today, someone can be infected with Hanta or Ebola and come to the states very quickly, infecting people without knowing it.

Problem of stopping a virus with a virus is if the virus will STAY stopped, especially with something like the flu. It "breeds" in south east asia amongst pigs and chickens and stuff like that, then hops over to humans and makes a pass across the globe with travelling people before petering out. The virus changes constantly, and because it isn't dependent on humans to carry it on means we can't eradicate it by immunizing ourselves to it. It would just stay amongst the animal hosts until it has changed sufficiently to again get past our defenses.

Agreed. It's just too dangerous imo to start genetically engineering virii. They're too prone to mutation. Didn't anyone see 12 Monkeys for christs sake?

 

[PC-Engine]

You fool, you left out the flesheating virus!

And also the T-Virus which turns people into zombies...

 

[London Geezer]

HIV and AIDS are two different things.
Cure for HIV doesn't mean cure for AIDS and vice versa.

People who already have AIDS will not be cured by this, so it's not an AIDS cure like the title of the thread says.

People who already have HIV won't be cured either, so whatever this is, it's not even a HIV cure.

It might be a vaccine, but you try to find people to test this on and i'll consider you the best persuader ever in history... I mean "Hey, we're looking for subjects willing to be injected this virus, it's a variant of HIV, and maybe if we're lucky it will be a vaccine for HIV, if we're not lucky, well, u get HIV!!" :? :|

 

[PC-Engine]

I suspect in the far future nanomachines populating our bloodstream will take care of any viruses.

 

[London Geezer]

And millions of people are just waiting for the HIV vaccine to be able to go around and have unprotected sex with EVERYONE they feel like it. Without considering that HIV is just one out of tens of dangerous viruses that can be transmitted through unprotected sex.

That's what really frightens me.

 

[Pepto-Bismol]

While channel surfing back in the mid-nineties, I stumbled upon the educational access program where I heard something I have never forgotten. The professor told his med students quite bluntly that he doubted there would ever be a cure for AIDS simply because HIV, while it may lie dormant for a decades, is mutating, craftily eluding detection by the body's immune system, so that when it does develop into full blown AIDS, the infected person could very well have a unique strain of the disease.

Consequently, each 'cure' would have to be unique, tailor-made for that person's genetic makeup and able to mutate alongside the virus until it was able to arrest it. And that assumes the person does not re-infect him or herself before they are cured of it, otherwise multiple strains may be mutating in parallel...

Now that is scary.