Antibodies May Hold Key to HIV
Suppression
Antibodies
may keep the HIV virus in check and one day let
patients stop taking antiretroviral drugs, two new preliminary trials
suggest. Researchers tried to quell HIV in 23 patients with infusions of an anti-HIV antibody
known as VRC01. The antibody was safe and repressed blood levels of HIV for a
short time before the virus reappeared, the researchers said. HIV is the virus
that can lead to AIDS.
"We
were not expecting that we were going to see a prolonged repression, because it
was only a single antibody," said co-study author Dr. Anthony Fauci,
director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. The
next phase is to infuse two or three antibodies intermittently, and see if
antiretroviral drugs can be withdrawn permanently, he explained.
After
regular intravenous infusions of VRC01, participants in the U.S. National
Institutes of Health and the AIDS Clinical Trials Group studies saw the virus
reappear in the blood, called viral rebound, at an average of 39 and 28 days,
respectively, after antiretroviral therapy was stopped.
Usually, HIV
rebounds within about two weeks after stopping therapy, the researchers noted.
These results indicate the antibody may have had a modest effect on temporarily
controlling HIV, Fauci said. "It is the very early stage of a new approach
to suppressing the virus," he explained.
If this
approach is successful, the possible benefit to patients is that they could
stop taking antiretroviral drugs altogether, Fauci said.
"Some
patients can't tolerate antiretroviral drugs or they have a virus that doesn't
do very well with antiretroviral drugs, and many patients are just tired of
taking a drug every day and some would say, 'I'd rather get an infusion every
few weeks,' " he said. Fauci said trials using two antibodies should start
in the next couple of months. "It's possible that we could get an antibody
that hangs around for a long time and you would only have to infuse it every
several months," he added.
For one
study, patients were given infusions of VRC01 before they stopped
antiretroviral therapy. Additional infusions were given at two and four weeks
after halting antiretroviral therapy and then monthly for up to six months. In
a second trial, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania and the
University of Alabama gave patients VRC01 infusions one week before stopping
antiretroviral therapy and then every three weeks for up to three doses.
The results
of the studies were published online Nov. 9 in the New England Journal of Medicine.
10.11.2016
The expert in anything was once a
beginner
No comments:
Post a Comment