Slashdot Mirror


Two Women Found With HIV-Immune Mutant Gene

Trokair writes "China Daily reports that researcher Tuofu Zhu has discovered two women in an HIV Research program that are immune to the disorder via a mutant gene."

14 of 723 comments (clear)

  1. Immune by ThndrShk2k · · Score: 4, Insightful

    With this they probably could make a vaccine or genetically engineer a "virus" that could prevent AIDS*The disorder caused by the HIV virus*

    --

    ~--~
    Do not mind the one with the crazy, for he is sane
  2. Re:Lucky ladies! by Mr.Sharpy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Now they can mess around all they want, au natural, and not worry about dying!

    Indeed! Now all they have to worry about is...
    Gohnorrea
    Herpes
    Chlamydia
    Syphillis
    Ge nital Warts
    HPV
    Hepatitus
    Trichomoniasis
    and more! Lucky bitches...

  3. Re:Lucky ladies! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Unfortunately, there's still this particular virus called "pregnancy" that continues to cause abrupt stoppage of sex when performed au natural.

  4. Re:Lucky ladies! by YOU+LIKEWISE+FAIL+IT · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I think it would be totally awesome if some kind of imaginary god did try and punish it's creation through the use of a cruel, life destroying virus - only to have his divine will deflected by something so simple as a tiny thicknesses of latex, education, testing and screening, as well as the hard work of doctors and scientists around the globe.

    Would me wonder who should be quaking in fear from who.

    --
    One god, one market, one truth, one consumer.
  5. Re:Spontaneous mutation? by fimbulvetr · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Just because something changes doesn't mean it's for the best and therefore it doesn't mean it is even remotely due to evolution.

    You really are a twit!

    Think about the logic...here, I'll help.

    Change (mutation) in person A.
    Person A is now immune to Disease B.
    Person A can't be infected by the disease.
    This is good!

    Wow, imagine that! It changed for the good!

    Now...

    Change (mutation) in person C.
    Person C is now a huge risk for Disease D, gets Disease D.
    Person C dies of Disease D.
    The changes are not passed on... (This is the opposite of bad, or in other words: good)
    Wow! ANOTHER `change` for the good!

    This was a generalized version.

    It takes us millions of years to develop frontal lobes, because there are millions of changes. Every single one of us has a mutation of some type, it's just that some of the mutations don't manifest themselves.

    Now, ideally, you understood this. If you didn't, good luck with the rest of your life.

  6. Re:Tell me it ain't so ! by tarunthegreat2 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You need to correct that even further. A greater NUMBER of people will die in the third-world, but even there, AIDS deaths are a very small PROPORTION of total deaths. People in the third-world are still dying from the "basics" - Hunger, Poverty, Diaorrhea, Cholera, TB, Malaria, e.t.c. Civilisation will end when we acknowledge George Bush as our Anointed God-On-Earth and (Shudder, Shiver) start pasting "What would W do?" on our car bumpers.

  7. Re:Tell me it ain't so ! by mrchaotica · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I've heard figures that around 1/3 of the total population of some African countries are HIV positive. Granted, a bunch will get picked off by something else before AIDS has a chance to get them, but it's still a significant proportion. Besides, most AIDS-related deaths aren't due to the virus itself, but rather it weakening your immune system enough for something else to get you.

    --

    "[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz

  8. Re:Tell me it ain't so ! by tarunthegreat2 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You've picked a few African countries, and you're most likely correct about them. But I've used the blanket term Third-World - in response to the post above mine), which includes India and China (that's a minimum of 2 Billion people. AIDS prevalence in this entire group is much, much less than 1%). But starvation/malnutrition, and the other diseases I've mentioned are at least 10%. I think the priorties there are clear. Most western agencies, when talking about India and China always mention figures, but they neve talk about percentages. In India, according to official figures there are meant to 0.5 million people suffering from AIDs, and think it's double that in China, of course, these official figures are usually crap... however, let's assume they're double that number, that still is nothing compared to the number of people dying from other diseases/afflictions.

  9. Re:Genetics at work? by grcumb · · Score: 5, Insightful

    HIV/AIDS caused by changing sexual mores? Puh-leese.

    Perhaps you could explain how this observation works with the fact that the most virulent New World disease (Syphilis) managed to spread like wildfire from Catholic Spain at the height of the Inquisition, throughout European society. And while you're at it, perhaps you could explain how it was still a significant and common disease at the height of the Victorian period.

    Maybe I'll save you the effort. Both Syphilis and HIV/AIDS were enabled by revolutions in *Human Mobility*, not changes in morality. The syphilis epidemic erupted at the same time that commerce via ship hit a spike, and HIV/AIDS hit us when air travel spiked.

    It's no surprise that 'Patient Zero' in the US HIV/AIDS outbreak was an airline steward. It *is* a coincidence that he happened to be gay.

    --
    Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
  10. Re:Tell me it ain't so ! by Danny+Rathjens · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Third-World [...], which includes India and China

    I think it is time to officially retire the term "third world" since hardly anyone has a clue what it means and keeps making up their own definitions. I have to admit that including a communist country with nuclear weapons is the most imaginitive inclusion in the "third world" I've yet to see.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_world

    Isn't it ironic?

  11. Re:Patents are the real key by jimicus · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Every time a lab does something with the caucasian mutation this lab send out a cease and desist.

    Cite?

    (Yes, I know not believing everything you read is genereally bad for the karma. So mod me down).

  12. Re:Tell me it ain't so ! by geekpolitico · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It is easy to say that education will solve the problem, but that doesn't even work in the US. Many people know of the dangers of AIDS and yet still have unprotected sex. It is stupid, but they do it. And this is in a country with relatively high ability to pass the protection/abstinence memes.

    In Africa there are massive cultural and practical barriers in place. It is much much harder to transmit this information widely, and there are strong cultural biases against abstinence/protection. The most sickening cultural belief is that having sex with a virgin cures you of AIDS. This is especially bad because between the long standing beliefs and the fact that people are sexually active younger there, the only virgins are very young children or babies. It's fairly horrifying.

    It will take a lot of time, effort and money to bring the AIDS crisis under control in Africa. President Bush was wise (for once) to commit billions to fighting the problem there. He was also wise to recommend that the program have an abstinence element to it. The Uganda program that contained an abstinence element was unusually successful in fighting AIDS in that country. I only wish he had lived up to his commitment by actually funding it at the level he promised.

    My parents spent the last 3 years living in Lesotho (the country inside of S. Africa), so they've spent a lot of time discussing this with the local Peace Corps volunteers. It is fairly discouraging, but very important that we do something about it.

  13. Re:Patents are the real key by jimicus · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Wonderful, wonderful. So now only one company in most of the developed world can research this promising avenue, rather than pooling the resources of charities, drugs companies and other researchers worldwide?

    The human race is going to be the first race in history to litigate itself into oblivion.

  14. Re:Tell me it ain't so ! by jdclucidly · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'm so angry about your short rant that I could spit. (And shame on you moderators.) But instead of throwing a fit, I'm going to spell it out for you very clearly starting with the most aggrecious of your claims:

    I know that stopping the transmission works. HIV patients need quarrantined (home bound etc) for their own protection from secondary diseases. Even treating them in the Hospital is a threat to their safety. They will not spread HIV and we don't need to treat them for the horrid illnesses they get when their failed immune systems contact the general world about them. Suggesting otherwise is to deny them the general protection of reverse isolation quarrantine that we do for other immuno compromised patients such as chemo therapy and transplant patients.

    Having been HIV+ for three years, and expecting to be so for the rest of my (possibly short) life, as I'm sure and expert like you is so aware, HIV and AIDS are two medical conditions. I expect to be free from the symptoms of AIDS for at least another ten years. Your comments here expose a profound misunderstanding of how HIV works, immuno reponse works, and the variety of drugs that can keep HIV/AIDS folks out of the red zone for a very long time. Indeed is was true 20 years ago that HIV meant extreme immuno vulnerablility but that is no longer the case.

    And for being an expert, somewhere along the way you, apparently, missed the class on medical ethics in which you would have learned that the central edict of medicine is increasing the quality of life for its recipients.

    I don't know what kind of Nazi fantasy world you live in but there is no way in hell you are going to put me under house arrest 'for my protection' so that you feel safer when you don't know where your children are or who they are doing. The very notion that we can social engineer sexual exposure out of our society is nieve at best and disturbed at worst.

    If I were to suggest that playing in the sewer was lots of fun and simply tell the kids that putting on rubber boots created "safe sewer play" equipment you would find me a dispicable person when I lead a booted class of kids into the sewers to play. There are activities and behaviors that are inherently dangerous and destructive. Making counter argument does not change the facts that these are dangerous.

    It sounds like you've been reading so Christian-right pro-abstainance bullshit. Your analogy fails in two ways:

    1. People aren't compelled by their very nature to go play in the sewer. As you may recall (if you can see through the hazy of your ideolgoy), as a young boy you were compelled automatically to desire sex.
    2. Boots do not sheath the vulnerable parts of your body (mouth and nose) from the air born bacteria in a sewer. Condoms sheath the vunerable parts of your body (penis, vagina, rectum) from the fluid born viri with which people are be concerned. To suggest otherwise does a disservice to those who engage in sexual activity because their will is weak and who would choose not to use protection because of your lies.