New Treatment Might Control AIDS

There's yet another "test" taking place that "promises" to help in the fight against AIDS.

A new type of treatment that trains immune system cells to better recognize the AIDS virus may help control the deadly and incurable infection, Australian researchers reported on Friday.

Tests on monkeys infected with a similar virus shows the treatment controlled the infection, although it does not cure it, and tests are already planned in people.

While this treatment does not "cure" AIDS, it does (so far) control it.

The treatment is called OPAL, for Overlapping Peptide-pulsed Autologous Cells, and would be categorized as an immunotherapy technique, or a so-called therapeutic vaccine, Stephen Kent of the University of Melbourne and colleagues said.

Writing in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS Pathogens, they said the treatment involves mixing a patient's own blood cells with tiny bits of protein from the virus.

These cells are then re-infused into the patient.

"Levels of virus in vaccinated monkeys were 10-fold lower than in controls, and this was durable for over one year after the initial vaccinations," they wrote.

When I read stories like this I try to remain hopeful that "this could be the one", but it gets more and more difficult with time.

I don't know how many times I have read an article on a research study that showed promising signs only to fail miserably when it came to human trials.

On the other hand, I do know that the cure will come. Even though this one doesn't sound like the cure, it's another step in the right direction.

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