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Possible Breakthrough for AIDS Cure
kryonD writes "Researchers believe they have found a new compound that could finally kill the HIV/AIDS virus, not just slow it down as current treatments do. While most of the community is still hesitant to comment on this until it passes peer review, initial results show that their method attacks and kills ALL variations of the virus. A fast track through the FDA could have one of the world's leading problems licked in less than a decade."
" In addition to being a potential checkmate to HIV, the compounds show indications of being just as effective against other diseases plaguing humankind - among them influenza, possibly even the dread bird flu, along with smallpox and herpes. "
Its a treatment that cures all that ails ya!
" Further, the compounds appear to have few limits on how they are delivered to patients. Although early indications are for application of CSAs with an ointment or cream, pills or injections may also be developed - if the compound gets to market. "
you can rub it on or drink it down, it don't matter!
Yeah, I think I will remain skeptical as well.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I'm no med student but the article states that: Ok, if this is true, then we've overcome the large part of AIDS (immunodeficiency). We can just boost the hell out of the white blood cell mimicking Ceragenins. Will this stop AIDS? Maybe not, but it will provide the defenses that AIDS rips from its patients. If I recall correctly, it's not the AIDS virus itself that kills a victim but instead another desease/sickness that occurs from a weakened immune system.
What's exciting is that the AIDS virus probably doesn't infect/reproduce when it is being killed by Ceragenins like it does to white blood cells. Thus, they may have something here if their premises hold true.
Googling for "Ceragenins" results in zero hits. Which means this is some magical elixir that is a mistakened cure all. Or perhaps it's something very obscure that no one has thought of until today? We shall see.
My work here is dung.
I dunno. So the compound destroys HIV in the test tube. AFAIK, this is underwhelming, because the problem with HIV is that it hides out inside cells where blood-borne drugs can't get to it. (I don't even think it's in there as a complete viral particle, probably just the RNA.)
You could hope that if you kept your bloodstream flooded with the drug you could nail each new virus as it emerged, but I seem to recall HIV can go directly from cell to cell, without entering the bloodstream at all.
I think our natural immune system kills off viral infections in substantial part by recognizing which of our cells are infected and killing them. That is, it's not just a question of wiping out the free virus, I think.
So just the fact that they've found something that kills AIDS is not particularly interesting.
What's required is to also do tests on cells, then animals, then humans. If they don't immediately keel over, then we can get a tad excited. Until then, it's about as promising a treatment as red fuming nitric acid (a real good AIDS zapper).
Ok, so I missed that word. I did RTFA but I'm still skeptical.
Viruses and bacteria are so different to me, rarely a treatment affects both.
CSA, in fact, stands for Cationic Steroid Antimicrobial and almost every piece of research involving them is centered on attacking bacteria.
How come zero hits turn up for Ceragenins when I search for it?
This article didn't include much of the above information and seemed to give a completely different name for CSAs than what they truly are--compound steroids used to primarily combat bacteria.
My work here is dung.
Never say never. I think there are a number of studies that have yet to be done on latently infected cells with integrated HIV. Without fully characterizing the latent cells, we can't really say that there isn't something different about them that can't be exploited for targeting treatments.
If leaders of the field are to be believed, anti-retroviral drug regimens can currently eliminate all infected cells in the body save for these latently infected ones. And if developments arise that allow specific targeting and elimination of the latent cells, boom problem is solved. I'm prophesizing a system of targeted immune activation to draw out the hiding infected cells, and letting existing drugs get rid of em.
I think the problem of replication and infection in the brain is also poorly understood. Personally, I think the extravasation of infected immune cells into the brain is the source of replication, rather than any of the resident cells. The cells in the brain that can host replication are extremely limited (microglia, barely in astrocytes), and there are already promising developments to stop replication with drugs that easily cross the blood brain barrier (minocycline stops hiv replication in microglia, attenuates neuronal apoptosis).
Gene therapy to deliver RNAi targeting HIV mRNAs offers another potential solution to this whole problem. I think the tools and most of the knowledge are out there. We just need to develop them to the point of usability. However, I really have little faith in the utility of the drug outlined in this study. Tons of crap kills HIV in a test tube. Let's see how toxic this drug is and its bioavailability/pharmocokinetic profile.
And they had a book value of about $98K as of their last quarterly report in Yahoo (which was Mar 05, I think) and just borrowed $3M at 10% interest last december - with a 10% commission to their loan agent. Their R&D budget seems to be a steady $0/quarter, so they don't do any of that. Their scientific advisor is a dermatologist, which isn't too surprising since they are a spinoff of a skin creme company. The website looks amatureish. As of todays market close, this company with a book value of (at most) $98K, no products and no R&D budget, now has a market cap of $46M. Can you say scam?
Even for the Cowpox vaccine, it wasn't completely random - it was as a result of an investigation into dairy workers to discover why smallpox didn't affect them. The discovery was part of a planned research project aimed at exactly that target.
This seems to carry with it the implication that the discovery of the smallpox vaccine was the result of a carefully-crafted study undertaken by a major pharmaceutical corporation. Keep in mind that the smallpox vaccine was discovered more than two hundred years ago by a lone guy who took a huge risk by infecting a boy with cowpox and then deliberately trying to infect him with smallpox. If the theory wasn't correct, well... oops! Vaccination was not exactly old hat at the time, either. The smallpox vaccine was the first vaccine, and the word "vaccine" itself is derived from - you guessed it - the latin word for cow, which is "vacca".
If you didn't mean to imply this, then I apologize.
Right now, there is a debate going on about the availability (and FDA approval) of an HPV vaccine. It is almost 100% effective at stopping a virus that can cause cervical cancer in women. What's the problem? The "Christians" (to use your quotes) are concerned that this will promote teen sex.
Use google, read all about it, and then get back to us. I don't hear the "Rest of America" yelling and screaming about this one. (Maybe they're all still in a tizzy about those homosexuals wanting to get married.[/sarcasm])