why is HIV/AIDS so hard to cure?
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Because they hide inside otherwise healthy T Cells which are a critical part of your immune system. The body can’t fight what it can’t find.
We know how to supress it but its a numbers game. Today we think maybe 40million people have HIV
We think maybe 35million in china have covid right now
We put a whole bunch of money and our top minds into fixing covid because that was our biggest problem, 40million with HIV is tragic but it has never been our biggest problem.
The mnra scentists who made the breakthroughs with covid vaccine at the time said look if you put this much money, this much time and this much expertise into fixing something, we will fix it
I’m no expert, but I’ll chime on. You can get all this and better from a few Google searches.
The body can’t fight AIDS/HIV. This is a big part of the problem. When you go to the doctor to get antibiotics for some infection, it is unlikely that it will kill you, you are only getting medication to speed things up. You don’t actually need the antibiotics.
The HIV virus hides and goes dormant all over the body. It slowly leaks out, some an hour later, some a day later, some weeks, months, years, and even decades. A tiny amount can quickly reinfect the entire body. so even if you are ok now, once you have been infected it can come back anytime, and you need to take medication for life.
It also hides itself very well, making it difficult for your body to kill it.
1. HIV integrates its RNA (converted to DNA) into the host cells genome. As long as that cell lives you will have HIV. So you have to not only destroy all the viruses but also all of the cells infected, and any cells those cells divide into.
2. HIV mutates rapidly, it can become more resistant to antiviral medications and require higher doses and/or combinations with other drugs or entirely new drugs
3. HIV infects immune cells, specifically CD4+ T cells which are important for regulating parts of the immune system. Without them the immune system is weakened and will have a harder time clearing a virus.
HIV has been cured 3 times. It involves irradiating/killing the bone marrow, which produces immune cells and blood cells and also gets infected with HIV. Then transplanting donor bone marrow from someone with a mutation making them resistant to infection with HIV. It is incredibly dangerous as the new bone marrow produces a foreign immune system which can often decide your body is one big pathogen and attack all of your cells which is ultimately fatal. To help prevent that you must take drugs that weaken this new immune system. Meaning you are in a similar state to when you had HIV even though you are now cured. All 3 of the people cured of HIV also had leukemia which this cured as well, it would not be approved in anyone who does not have leukemia as it is too dangerous with not much benefit.
While not curable with drugs, HIV can be controlled to levels so low you test negative on HIV tests. People receiving HIV treatment can live almost completely normal lives.
It mutates so rapidly it’s difficult to vaccinate against and it hides from the immune system
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