First Documented Case of Child Cured of HIV

[lynn82md.livejournal.com]

Dr. Deborah Persaud of Johns Hopkins University today described the first documented case of a child being cured of HIV. The landmark findings were announced at the 2013 Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections in Atlanta, GA.

Dr. Persaud, an amfAR grantee, detailed the case of a two-year-old child in Mississippi diagnosed with HIV at birth and immediately put on antiretroviral therapy. At 18 months, the child ceased taking antiretrovirals and was lost to follow-up. When brought back into care at 23 months, despite being off treatment for five months, the child was found to have an undetectable viral load. A battery of subsequent highly sensitive tests confirmed the absence of HIV.

Confirmation of the cure was made possible by a grant the Foundation awarded to Dr. Persaud and Dr. Katherine Luzuriaga of the University of Massachusetts in September 2012. The grant allowed Drs. Persaud and Luzuriaga to establish a research collaboratory to explore and document possible pediatric HIV cure cases. The collaboratory includes renowned researchers Drs. Stephen Spector and Doug Richman at the University of California, San Diego; Dr. Frank Maldarelli at the National Cancer Institute; and Dr. Tae-Wook Chun at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious

This is awesome :)