First HIV Cure

[Faye]

This is fairly impressive.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/06/05/eveningnews/main20069146.shtml

I didn't know that some people were immune to HIV, but apparently they exist. They did a stem-cell bone marrow transplant of an immune person for someone who had leukemia and HIV.

 

[grt$5vb]

Thanks, I hadn't heard.

 

[magister343]

Isn't this rather old news? The article says June of this year, but I'm pretty sure I first read about this a couple years ago and have known about the resistance of some Europeans for at least 5 years.

This article says that about 1% of Caucasians are immune, but neglects to mention that closer to 10% of those of European descent have at least some degree of resistance. Those with the most resistance have ancestors from the areas that were hardest and most recently hit by The Black Death (mostly small towns in Western Europe), which seems to imply that the genes for HIV resistance proliferated because they also provided resistance to the Plague.

 

[Bird]

Magister is correcto. Imagine that.


Thanks for posting this Dragonian.

 

[Faye]

I guess so. I missed it though, and so did tons of other people.

 

[subwayrider]

I read this a while ago on Yahoo News. Was it 1% of the Caucasian population?

I don't see how it'll help with overpopulation, but OK.

 

[InvisibleJim]

I read this a while ago on Yahoo News. Was it 1% of the Caucasian population?

I don't see how it'll help with overpopulation, but OK.

Force HIV on non-Caucasians?

....

No comment.

 

[subwayrider]

Force HIV on non-Caucasians?

....

No comment.

Sensitive, as always.

 

[magister343]

I read this a while ago on Yahoo News. Was it 1% of the Caucasian population?

I don't see how it'll help with overpopulation, but OK.

1% of Caucasians are immune; 10% are at least somewhat resistant.

 

[Peppermint]

According to Wired it was the smallpox, not plague.

Genetic resistance to AIDS works in different ways and appears in different ethnic groups. The most powerful form of resistance, caused by a genetic defect, is limited to people with European or Central Asian heritage. An estimated 1 percent of people descended from Northern Europeans are virtually immune to AIDS infection, with Swedes the most likely to be protected. One theory suggests that the mutation developed in Scandinavia and moved southward with Viking raiders.

 

[magister343]

Plague is, or at lest used to be, a pretty generic term. Experts today tend towards the opinion that the Black Death was not a single disease caused by only yersinia pestis, but several epidemics including anthrax and smallpox.