People who become infected with HIV sometimes remain healthy for years without medication. Scientists from the American Harvard Medical School have now discovered that this could be due to small variations in one protein.
One in three hundred people who have been infected with HIV hardly notices it. Without the help of drugs their immune system keeps the virus under control and they don't get sick. Until now it was unclear why. The researchers, including Dr. Paul de Bakker, who also works at UMC Utrecht, have now discovered the gene that is responsible for this.
Most of the long-term survivors appears to differ poorly in one gene with that of other HIV-positive patients † The researchers hope that the discovery of the gene could point the way to better HIV treatment.
Vaccine
Developing a vaccine will still take a lot of time † But when it becomes clear how the immune system can respond effectively to an HIV infection, this can certainly be used in the development of a vaccine †
In the Netherlands, more than 8,000 people have AIDS and nearly 17,000 people are registered as HIV-positive. However, the total number of HIV-positive people is estimated at more than 21,500 people.
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