An ongoing dialogue on HIV/AIDS, infectious diseases,
June 13th, 2012
Questions About HIV Cure, and a Very Funny Quote
The single case of HIV cure following allogeneic bone marrow transplant is in the news again, this time because of data just presented at “The International Workshop on HIV and Hepatitis Virus Drug Resistance and Curative Strategies” (formerly known as the “HIV Resistance Workshop” — how’s that for rebranding?). I’m not at the meeting, which is too […]
November 29th, 2011
HIV Cure Makes the NY Times — Anything New to Report?
It’s right there, on page 1 of today’s Science Times: Medical researchers are again in pursuit of a goal they had all but abandoned: curing AIDS. Until recently, the possibility seemed little more than wishful thinking. But the experiences of two patients now suggest to many scientists that it may be achievable. Two patients? What, did I […]
December 17th, 2010
Update on Berlin Patient II: Still Cured of HIV
First, who was Berlin Patient I? Second, over in the journal Blood is the latest update on Berlin Patient II, the guy apparently cured of HIV by bone marrow transplantation: We have previously reported the case of an HIV-infected patient in whom viral replication remained absent despite discontinuation of antiretroviral therapy after transplantation with CCR5Δ32/Δ32 stem cells… In […]
October 7th, 2010
Post-Halladay Video Treat: Prospects for HIV Cure
For a little entertainment between playoff games — but how could anyone beat the guy in the picture? — you might want to check out this interview I did with Dan Kuritzkes about the prospects for an HIV cure. So which do you think we’ll see first — an HIV cure or a vaccine? And I don’t mean an […]
July 1st, 2010
RFA-AI-10-009, HIV Cure, and “Berlin Patient” Update
Interesting “RFA” (Request for Application, #RFA-AI-10-009) from Bethesda: The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), National Institutes of Health (NIH), encourage grant applications from institutions/organizations to address the problem of HIV-1 persistence in HIV-1-infected persons treated with suppressive antiretroviral drug regimens… The goal of this initiative […]
April 14th, 2010
Maraviroc Rarely Used for Treatment-Naive Patients
Over in Journal of Infectious Diseases, the MERIT study was recently published (with Chuck Hicks’ Journal Watch summary here), demonstrating that maraviroc is non-inferior to efavirenz — provided that the enhanced-sensitivity tropism test is used to select appropriate candidates. (The MERIT study began in 2004-5. Don’t think I’ll ever forget that, since the investigator meeting overlapped […]
November 17th, 2008
Promising C diff Rx, and Google as Surveillance Tool
A few items from recent ID/HIV news: Bad enough when it happens once, relapsing C diff is one of the modern plagues for which our bag of tricks sometimes comes up woefully short. (Anything that tests stool transplants as a therapy is pretty desperate.) Here was some bright news on the treatment front, however: an experimental […]
Paul E. Sax, MD
Contributing Editor
NEJM Journal Watch
Infectious Diseases
Biography | Disclosures | Summaries
Learn more about HIV and ID Observations.
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