Complete recovery is possible? HIV and stem cells

     After the success of antiretroviral therapy for HIV by the scientific community had the next goal - to develop the means to completely rid the body of the virus. That this is possible at all, it became clear after the event, Timothy Brown, who has been HIV-positive for as long as he in 2007 was not transplanted donor stem cells for the treatment of leukaemia. As a result, his body is completely rid of HIV, including the fact that the donor cells lacked a key receptor required for virus entry into the cell.   

      At the Washington conference was addressed by infectious disease hospital of the Boston Brigham and Women's  (Timothy Henrich). He spoke of two of their HIV-positive patients who were transplanted stem cells, which present the same receptor. In addition, prior to transplantation, they were smaller than Brown, the dose of chemotherapy, and during the procedure, patients Henricha, unlike Brown, continued receiving antiviral drugs.     

      Stem cells do not take effect immediately, but ten months after transplantation, both patients were found in the blood of any traces of HIV.After transplantation, the two men developed the disease "graft-versus-host" when donor immune cells attack the cells of the "host", which they recognize as foreign. Believed Henrich and his colleagues, it is a state helped the patient's body to get rid of HIV - antivirals protected donor cells from the virus, and then destroy healthy cells Infected "master" cells. Currently the team Henricha watching cure HIV patients, as a key moment in the story is the following: does status quo after withdrawal of antiviral drugs.