[Pontiac]

While the virus would still exist in a person's system, it would be unable to develop into AIDS and individuals could maintain a healthy immune system. The therapy would mean that HIV would never deteriorate into AIDS, spelling an end to onerous drug regimes.

This tiny little article leaves me with a few questions.

It seems that they are curing AIDS but not HIV; so is the patient still able to transmit HIV?

The article says that the patient is given therapy; so does the patient need therapy for the rest of his life or only for a short time. (I don’t think of therapy as resulting in a lasting cure. Maybe I am wrong)

[naturalman1975]

I attended a Q&A with one of the scientists involved and this is my understanding of what she said.

It seems that they are curing AIDS but not HIV; so is the patient still able to transmit HIV?

Yes, although the virus load will probably be lower, so it will be less likely.

The article says that the patient is given therapy; so does the patient need therapy for the rest of his life or only for a short time. (I don’t think of therapy as resulting in a lasting cure. Maybe I am wrong)

If it pans out as they hope, it will be a lasting treatment not ongoing therapy. The treatment will be complicated and expensive but once it's over the person will almost certainly never develop AIDS. And when it comes to expense, it will almost certainly be less than the expected cost of a lifetime of retroviral treatments.

[Jim Noble]

The article is incomprehensible, but perhaps they are altering the virus via molecular engineering to render it non-pathogenic.

That’s one of two possible approaches. The second is somehow activating latent virus (all of it at the same time), coaxing it out of macrophages and T-cell precursors (somehow), and then killing it conventionally.

There has been some (very early) progress along path #2, I haven’t heard of any progress with #1. As I said, the article itself is meaningless and I have no idea what they are describing.