Beautiful Virgin Islands

Thursday, Sep 18, 2025

30-Year-Old Woman Whose HIV Vanished Gives Hope For AIDS Cure

30-Year-Old Woman Whose HIV Vanished Gives Hope For AIDS Cure

Progress against AIDS over the past two decades has inspired a commitment by United Nations member states to end the epidemic by 2030.

All signs of HIV have disappeared in a young woman who was diagnosed with the virus that causes AIDS in 2013, researchers said, raising hopes that she may be one of a handful of people worldwide who has permanently fought off the infection.

The 30-year-old mother, originally from the city of Esperanza in Argentina, has the clinical features of an HIV "elite controller," meaning her infection has been undetectable for years. It didn't reemerge even after she stopped taking powerful drugs to treat it, which is what normally happens, researchers said in a studyslated for publication in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

The virus also doesn't appear to have integrated into her DNA, creating what is known as a provirus, and extensive testing failed to turn it up anywhere. It's possible that she has experienced what is known as a "sterilizing cure," meaning she is no longer carrying a replicating form of the virus, they said.

No Answers


How it happened is a mystery. At least two other HIV patients have also been deemed cured, but both underwent extensive treatment for blood cancer that involved stem cell transplants. The researchers offered no answers as to how the young mother eradicated the virus, but her existence suggests it is possible.

The virus "was not detected in an elite controller despite analysis of massive numbers of cells from blood and tissues, suggesting that this patient may have naturally achieved a sterilizing cure of HIV-1 infection," said researchers led by Xu Yu at Boston's Ragon Institute and Natalia Laufer from the Institute of Biomedical Research in Retrovirus and AIDS in Buenos Aires. "These observations raise the possibility that a sterilizing cure may be an extremely rare but possible outcome of HIV-1 infection."

Doctors have tried unsuccessfully for decades to eradicate the virus within patients. While combination drug therapies can suppress it so it's no longer detectable, the vast majority of patients still have a reservoir that's reactivated after treatment stops. Finding another person who's virus-free raises the hope for other ways to wipe out the reservoir and cure more people.

It's possible the patient's initial immune response to HIV led to an abortive infection or that her immune system became better at recognizing and destroying it over time, leaving only remnants of HIV behind, said co-author Sharon Lewin, director of the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity at the University of Melbourne.

"People are excited about it because it's sort of another pathway to a cure," Lewin said in an interview Wednesday. "You can eventually get rid of intact virus and you're just left with these footprints of the virus."

About 1% of Caucasian people living with HIV develop control over the infection. It's possible a subset may be cured, meaning they no longer have any replication-competent HIV, said Lewin, who is studying the genetic details of what constitutes a cure.

'Berlin Patient'


The researchers said the Argentinian woman, whose partner died of AIDS in July 2017, resembles the "Berlin patient." That man, Timothy Brown, developed a probable sterilizing cure of HIV after undergoing a stem cell transplant to treat acute myeloid leukemia almost 15 years ago.

Since the beginning of the AIDS epidemic, almost 80 million people have been infected with HIV and 36.3 million people have died from complications of the viral illness. Worldwide, an estimated 37.7 million people were living with HIV in 2020.

Progress against AIDS over the past two decades has inspired a commitment by United Nations member states to end the epidemic by 2030. The number of people newly infected with HIV fell to 1.5 million worldwide in 2020, from 3 million in 1997.

Newsletter

Related Articles

Beautiful Virgin Islands
0:00
0:00
Close
US Tech Giants Pledge Billions to UK AI Infrastructure Following Starmer's Call
Saudi Arabia cracks down on music ‘lounges’ after conservative backlash
DeepMind and OpenAI Achieve Gold at ‘Coding Olympics’ in AI Milestone
SEC Allows Public Companies to Block Investors from Class-Action Lawsuits
Saudi Arabia Signs ‘Strategic Mutual Defence’ Pact with Pakistan, Marking First Arab State to Gain Indirect Access to Nuclear Strike Capabilities in the Region
Federal Reserve Cuts Rates by Quarter Point and Signals More to Come
Effective and Impressive Generation Z Protest: Images from the Riots in Nepal
European manufacturers against ban on polluting cars: "The industry may collapse"
Sam Altman sells the 'Wedding Estate' in Hawaii for 49 million dollars
Trump: Cancel quarterly company reports and settle for reporting once every six months
Turkish car manufacturer Togg Enters German Market with 5-Star Electric Sedan and SUV to Challenge European EV Brands
US Launches New Pilot Program to Accelerate eVTOL Air Taxi Deployment
Christian Brueckner Released from German Prison after Serving Unrelated Sentence
World’s Longest Direct Flight China Eastern to Launch 29-Hour Shanghai–Buenos Aires Direct Flight via Auckland in December
New OpenAI Study Finds Majority of ChatGPT Use Is Personal, Not Professional
Hong Kong Industry Group Calls for HK$20 Billion Support Fund to Ease Property Market Stress
Joe Biden’s Post-Presidency Speaking Fees Face Weak Demand amid Corporate Reluctance
Charlie Kirk's murder will break the left's hateful cancel tactics
Kash Patel erupts at ‘buffoon’ Sen. Adam Schiff over Russiagate: ‘You are the biggest fraud’
Homeland Security says Emmy speech ‘fanning the flames of hatred’ after Einbinder’s ‘F— ICE’ remark
Charlie Kirk’s Alleged Assassin Tyler Robinson Faces Death Penalty as Charges Formally Announced
Actor, director, environmentalist Robert Redford dies at 89
The conservative right spreads westward: a huge achievement for 'Alternative for Germany' in local elections
JD Vance Says There Is “No Unity” with Those Who Celebrate Charlie Kirk’s Killing, and he is right!
Trump sues the 'New York Times' for an astronomical sum of 15 billion dollars
Florida Hospital Welcomes Its Largest-Ever Baby: Annan, Nearly Fourteen Pounds at Birth
U.S. and Britain Poised to Finalize Over $10 Billion in High-Tech, Nuclear and Defense Deals During Trump State Visit
China Finds Nvidia Violated Antitrust Laws in Mellanox Deal, Deepens Trade Tensions with US
US Air Force Begins Modifications on Qatar-Donated Jet Amid Plans to Use It as Air Force One
Pope Leo Warns of Societal Crisis Over Mega-CEO Pay, Citing Tesla’s Proposed Trillion-Dollar Package
Poland Green-Lights NATO Deployment in Response to Major Russian Drone Incursion
Elon Musk Retakes Lead as World’s Richest After Brief Ellison Surge
U.S. and China Agree on Framework to Shift TikTok to American Ownership
London Daily Podcast: London Massive Pro Democracy Rally, Musk Support, UK Economic Data and Premier League Results Mark Eventful Weekend
This Week in AI: Meta’s Superintelligence Push, xAI’s Ten Billion-Dollar Raise, Genesis AI’s Robotics Ambitions, Microsoft Restructuring, Amazon’s Million-Robot Milestone, and Google’s AlphaGenome Update
Le Pen Tightens the Pressure on Macron as France Edges Toward Political Breakdown
Musk calls for new UK government at huge pro-democracy rally in London, but Britons have been brainwashed to obey instead of fighting for their human rights
Elon Musk responds to post calling for the murder of Erika Kirk, widow of Charlie Kirk: 'Either we fight back or they will kill us'
Czech Republic signs €1.34 billion contract for Leopard 2A8 main battle tanks with delivery from 2028
USA: Office Depot Employees Refused to Print Poster in Memory of Charlie Kirk – and Were Fired
Proposed U.S. Bill Would Allow Civil Suits Against Judges Who Release Repeat Violent Offenders
Penske Media Sues Google Over “AI Overviews,” Claiming It Uses Journalism Without Consent and Destroys Traffic
Indian Student Engineers Propose “Project REBIRTH” to Protect Aircraft from Crashes Using AI, Airbags and Smart Materials
French Debt Downgrade Piles Pressure on Macron’s New Prime Minister
US and UK Near Tech, Nuclear and Whisky Deals Ahead of Trump Trip
One in Three Europeans Now Uses TikTok, According to the Chinese Tech Giant
Could AI Nursing Robots Help Healthcare Staffing Shortages?
NATO Deploys ‘Eastern Sentry’ After Russian Drones Violate Polish Airspace
Anesthesiologist Left Operation Mid-Surgery to Have Sex with Nurse
Tens of Thousands of Young Chinese Get Up Every Morning and Go to Work Where They Do Nothing
×