Today doctors revealed that HIV-positive woman, who was battling the disease for over a decade, is free from the virus.
Unidentified, 30-year-old Argentinean man is the only one to have their immune systems naturally eliminate the virus.
The ‘Esperanza Patient’, as she is known, was first diagnosed with HIV in 2013 — but now has undetectable levels of the virus in her body.
She was not prescribed any medication for the eight years she had been diagnosed, except six months during her pregnancy to keep her baby healthy.
The discovery could lead to a cure for 38 million people affected by AIDS worldwide, researchers claim.
Unidentified, 30-year old man is just the second to be naturally cured of the virus by their immune system. The virus has been naturally eliminated in one person. Loreen Willenberg (pictured) was the first to be revealed in August. San Francisco’s 67 year-old woman was first diagnosed with HIV in August 1998.
Unidentified, 30-year-old Esperanza resident is the only person whose body has been naturally cured of the virus.
The discovery was made by a group of Harvard-based doctors at an international conference of HIV specialists in March.
The patient’s ex-boyfriend, who had died from AIDS, was found to have no disease-causing virus.
Now, the Annals of Internal Medicine confirms these findings.
Dr. Xu Yu, along with his colleagues, found no evidence of the virus within the 1.5billion tissue and blood cells that they examined.
The woman’s identity is not known, but doctors described her as ‘athletic’ and ‘beautiful’. They also revealed that she was pregnant with a man and had a baby. Both of them were HIV-negative.
Naturally, only one other person has experienced the same miracle. Loreen willenberg’s tale was revealed for the first time last August. San Francisco-based Loreen Willenberg, 67, was diagnosed in 2003 with HIV.
She could, according to academics be “added” to the “list of HIV-cured HIV patients,” along with Timothy Ray Brown from Berlin and Adam Castillejo from London.
Mr Brown and Mr Castillejo both had been diagnosed with cancer. They received a bone marrow donation from a donor who has HIV-resistant genes. This allowed them to eliminate the disease as well as the AIDS-causing virus.
But neither Ms Willenberg — or the Esperanza patient — had the risky treatment.
Two women in particular are elite controllers. These rare people have never received antiretroviral therapy, but they show no evidence of the virus.
HIV attaches normally to the immune cells of the person who is infected and begins reproducing from them.
While anti-retroviral therapies can be used to stop HIV from recurring, they cannot eradicate the virus completely. People must still receive treatment daily to control the virus.
Adam Castillejo was 40 years old and the second HIV-positive individual in the world. In a statement earlier in the year, he said he was the London patient.
‘Berlin Patient’ Timothy Ray Brown was successfully cured of the HIV virus 12 years ago
For one in 200 people who are elite controllers, however, most virus is able to settle into inactive portions of the genome. They’re known as gene deserts and do not cause any harm. The immune system is able to clear the virus from remaining areas.
Dr Yu is based at Massachusetts General Hospital and said that his findings, particularly the identification of the second case, suggest there might be a way to sterilize people who aren’t able to do so on their own.
“We now look at the possibility to induce this type of immunity in persons on the ART by vaccination, with the purpose of educating the immune system to be capable of controlling the virus without using ART.”
In Annals of Internal Medicine the researchers stated that “The subject described in this paper is originally from Esperanza, Argentina.”
We propose that we refer to her in accordance with her wishes as the “Esperanza patients” to express our hopes for finding a cure.