{"id":5432,"date":"2026-05-12T17:14:56","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T17:14:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=5432"},"modified":"2026-05-12T17:14:56","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T17:14:56","slug":"small-study-hints-that-revving-up-immune-cells-might-help-fight-hiv","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=5432","title":{"rendered":"Small study hints that revving up immune cells might help fight HIV"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

By LAURAN NEERGAARD, AP Medical Writer<\/strong><\/p>\n

WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 Scientists are tweaking a powerful cancer therapy in hopes it could fight HIV instead, by supercharging patients\u2019 own immune cells.<\/p>\n

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On Tuesday, researchers said a single dose of those revved-up cells strongly suppressed HIV in two people \u2014 one for nearly a year and the other for nearly two years \u2014 without requiring their usual medicines.<\/p>\n

Larger and longer studies are needed to prove if what\u2019s called CAR-T cell therapy might really offer long-lasting help for HIV, cautioned Dr. Steven Deeks of the University of California, San Francisco, who led the research.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe find the fact that two people have had such a really sustained response provocative,\u201d he said. \u201cThere is a real need for a one-and-done, safe and scalable cure \u2026 and this is one of the strategies that we\u2019re pursuing.\u201d<\/p>\n

The data is being presented at a meeting of the American Society of Gene and Cell Therapy in Boston.<\/p>\n

There are nearly 40 million people living with HIV around the world. Today\u2019s medicines have turned the virus that causes AIDS from a fast killer into a manageable chronic disease, often keeping the virus at undetectable levels, but only if people can afford the drugs and stick with them. The virus hides out in reservoirs in the body and rebounds fast if people stop treatment.<\/p>\n

Researchers have long hunted an elusive cure, pursuing such clues as a rare gene mutation that makes some people naturally resistant to HIV or how a handful of HIV patients who also had certain cancers were declared cured or in long-term remission after receiving a stem cell transplant, something too risky for most people.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

CAR-T therapy involves taking immune soldiers called T cells out of a person\u2019s blood, genetically engineering them into \u201cliving drugs\u201d and infusing them back into the patient. They\u2019re widely used to cure certain types of cancer and are being studied for other diseases.<\/p>\n

For HIV, scientists at the nonprofit drug developer Caring Cross created CAR-T cells with dual features. They\u2019re programmed to better find and kill HIV-infected cells \u2014 and engineered with protection against infection by the very virus they\u2019re supposed to fight.<\/p>\n

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With that added armor, they should be able to reproduce enough to keep HIV in check, said Caring Cross executive director Boro Dropuli\u0107.<\/p>\n

Deeks\u2019 early-stage experiment tested different dosing strategies in people who stopped their HIV medicine the day they received their CAR-T cells. There were no serious side effects. The first three recipients showed no response and resumed their usual medicines.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

Six others received a small amount of chemotherapy to make space for the new T cells. Those two strong responders saw their HIV drop to undetectable levels, inching up only occasionally when the CAR-T cells presumably got to work again. A third patient had a temporary response and resumed regular HIV treatment.<\/p>\n

Those three patients all had started their original HIV treatment soon after they\u2019d been infected, Deeks said. That makes sense because people treated early tend to have less HIV hiding in the body and a healthier immune system.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is certainly very fascinating that they\u2019ve had this positive response,\u201d said Dr. Hans-Peter Kiem, a gene therapy expert at Seattle\u2019s Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center who wasn\u2019t part of the new study. He cautioned that it will take additional research to prove if CAR-T really works.<\/p>\n

But the strategy is exciting because it\u2019s \u201cboosting what our body, our immune system, can already do,\u201d said Andrea Gramatica, vice president for research at amfAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research, which is funding some work to create easier-to-use versions.<\/p>\n

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute\u2019s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Scientists are supercharging patients’ own immune cells in CAR-T cell therapy to try to fight HIV without today’s drugs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5431,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5432","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-facts","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nSmall study hints that revving up immune cells might help fight HIV - Silicon Valley Moving Post<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=5432\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Small study hints that revving up immune cells might help fight HIV - 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