Published: 2013 March 04 10:07:56 (3136 Views)

A baby has been 'functionally cured' of the virus which causes Aids, prompting new hope that children born with HIV can have healthy lives without the need for drug treatment.

The girl, who is now two and a half years old, has been off medication for about a year and doctors say there are no signs of infection after she received treatment soon after being born with HIV.

Doctors say the potentially ground-breaking development is 'about as close to a cure, if not a cure, that we've seen'.

Aids specialists meeting in Atlanta, Georgia, described the case, which happened in Mississippi, and revealed that, while there is no guarantee the child will remain healthy, there are only traces of the virus' genetic material still lingering.

If the girl continues to remain healthy it would be only the world's second reported cure.

Dr Hannah Gay, a paediatric HIV specialist at the University of Mississippi, gave the baby faster and stronger treatment than usual, starting a three-drug infusion within 30 hours of birth.

That was before tests confirmed the infant was infected and not just at risk from a mother whose HIV was not diagnosed until she was in labour.

'I just felt like this baby was at higher-than-normal risk, and deserved our best shot,' she said.

That fast action apparently knocked out HIV in the baby's blood before it could form hideouts in the body.
 
Those so-called reservoirs of dormant cells usually rapidly reinfect anyone who stops medication, said Dr Deborah Persaud of Johns Hopkins Children's Centre.

She led the investigation that deemed the child 'functionally cured', meaning in long-term remission even if all traces of the virus have not been completely eradicated.

Dr Persaud's team is now planning a study to try to prove that, with more aggressive treatment of other high-risk babies.
'Maybe we'll be able to block this reservoir seeding,' she said.

The mother's HIV is being controlled with medication and she was 'quite excited for her child', Dr Gay added.


- Metro

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