A worldwide research push to discover how HIV hides dormant in the human body may soon lead to a curative treatment for the virus which results in AIDS. The deputy director of the Centre for Virus Research at the Westmead Millennium Institute (WMI) in Sydney, Associate Professor Sarah Palmer, says such a cure might be found within the next 10 to 20 years.<\/p>\n
A worldwide research push to discover how HIV hides dormant in the\u00a0human body may soon lead to a curative treatment for the virus which results in AIDS. The deputy director of the\u00a0Centre for Virus Research at the Westmead Millennium Institute (WMI) in Sydney, Associate Professor Sarah\u00a0Palmer, says such a cure might be found within the next 10 to 20 years.<\/p>\n
Palmer, who joined the WMI this year after building a global reputation as a HIV researcher while in Sweden and the
\nUnited States, says researchers around the world are trying to work out which cells \u201chold on to\u201d HIV and allow the
\nvirus to persist during effective therapy.<\/p>\n
Speaking in the lead up to World AIDS Day on December 1, Associate Professor Palmer said her team of
\nresearchers is trying to understand the genetic characteristics and dynamics of persistent HIV across a range of
\ntissues and cells.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are looking particularly closely at different tissue sites such as the gut and lymph nodes where it is thought 90
\nper cent of the dormant infected T-cells reside,\u201d said Associate Professor Palmer.<\/p>\n
\u201cHIV inserts its DNA into the body\u2019s T-cells and can sit in a resting phase in the human body for years before the Tcells\u00a0are woken up to fight another disease.<\/p>\n
\u201cOnce they wake up and replicate, they also produce HIV \u2013 and this happens time and time again in HIV patients.\u201d
\n\u201cThe T-cells are the fuse that ignites the ticking time bomb and we want to know exactly which kinds of T-cells are
\nlikely to \u201cexplode\u201d into the full-blown disease.\u201d<\/p>\n
Research conducted by Associate Professor Palmer and Swedish colleagues \u2013 published today in the PNAS
\n(Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences) journal – shows that early commencement of regular anti-viral
\nchemotherapy results in fewer hidden HIV-infected cells.<\/p>\n
The preliminary data findings of the paper, assisted Associate Professor Palmer in receiving a $873,416 National
\nHealth and Medical Council grant (reference APP1061681), to conduct further research into characterising latent
\nHIV.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen a person is infected with HIV they must begin lifelong therapy because the virus always persists and is never
\ncured. Unfortunately we don\u2019t know all the sites and all the cells in the body where the virus is hiding during therapy.
\n\u201cWe also don\u2019t know if there are some patients whose genetic make-up means their cells hide less of the latent virus
\nduring therapy.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we can pinpoint the infected cells more precisely and then wake them up from their dormancy, we can then work
\non ways to purge the virus from these cells.\u201d<\/p>\n
Palmer says current therapies for HIV do not offer a cure although they can significantly prolong the lifespan of the
\nperson infected.<\/p>\n
She is concerned that the relative success of current treatments has led to some apathy amongst the community,
\nresulting in a rise in unsafe sex and a consequent minor upswing in HIV infections.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople think \u201coh the medical profession can treat HIV now\u201d but the reality is most treatment involves long term
\nchemotherapy, not cure and sometimes it can even make the patient sick.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThese treatments aren\u2019t really very satisfactory and it\u2019s my dream to be able to find a properly curative treatment for
\nthe disease.<\/p>\n
Associate Professor Palmer was inspired to pursue HIV research by a visit to Kenya in 1991, where large numbers
\nof children and young people were dying from the disease.<\/p>\n
\u201cOnce I saw what was happening in Kenya I said this can\u2019t continue and I have to do something about it.\u201d
\nShe says that, globally, there is now a lot of hope that a cure can be found.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are at the beginning stages of a push towards that cure and I\u2019m very happy to be part of such an exceptional
\nteam of medical researchers at the WMI and across the globe as we try for more breakthroughs.\u201d<\/p>\n
A worldwide research push to discover how HIV hides dormant in the human body may soon lead to a curative treatment for the virus which results in AIDS. The deputy director of the Centre for Virus Research at the Westmead Millennium Institute (WMI) in Sydney, Associate Professor Sarah Palmer, says such a cure might be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":2446,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"default","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}}},"categories":[19],"class_list":["post-2494","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cat-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wimr.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/2494","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wimr.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wimr.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wimr.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2446"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wimr.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wimr.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}