Trokair writes "China Daily reports that researcher Tuofu Zhu has discovered two women in an HIV Research program that are immune to the disorder via a mutant gene."
Well, we are a very capable species. We will not die off easily. Aids/HIV are dangerous and deadly to us. It was just a matter of time before our own bodies figured out how to survive this virus. We have a good package to work with.
Just my first thoughts on the subject. I would like to know more about the study.
It was just a matter of time before our own bodies figured out how to survive this virus.
I don't think that's exactly the case. HIV is only twenty-five years old, which certainly isn't enough time for genetic evolution to take place (especially considering the relatively slow reporductive rate of humans).
It's more likely they've an odd mutant gene that by coincadence makes them immune to the virus.
"I don't think that's exactly the case. HIV is only twenty-five years old, which certainly isn't enough time for genetic evolution to take place (especially considering the relatively slow reporductive rate of humans)."
HIV is most certainly NOT only 25 years old. It's extremely old, they have preserved tissue samples from almost 50 years ago or so that have been found to contain the virus (the subject died in exactly the same way as the first cases presented here) (an english sailor died of a oppertunistic diseases, and after he died, tissue was preserved for later study.)
The event that has made HIV into a new epidemic is massive changes in social morality. Originally, HIV was called the Gay-Related immuno-deficiency syndrome or somesuch, because it was primarily affecting people who were outwardly gay.
Of course, it turned out that these people were just starting to be very broad in their choice of partners, and of course, people were starting to share needles for drug use.
HIV/AIDS caused by changing sexual mores? Puh-leese.
Perhaps you could explain how this observation works with the fact that the most virulent New World disease (Syphilis) managed to spread like wildfire from Catholic Spain at the height of the Inquisition, throughout European society. And while you're at it, perhaps you could explain how it was still a significant and common disease at the height of the Victorian period.
Maybe I'll save you the effort. Both Syphilis and HIV/AIDS were enabled by revolutions in *Human Mobility*, not changes in morality. The syphilis epidemic erupted at the same time that commerce via ship hit a spike, and HIV/AIDS hit us when air travel spiked.
It's no surprise that 'Patient Zero' in the US HIV/AIDS outbreak was an airline steward. It *is* a coincidence that he happened to be gay.
HIV is only twenty-five years old, which certainly isn't enough time for genetic evolution to take place.
Mutations happen all the time - 0.0000000000000214/nucleotide/generation according to these guys [nih.gov]. Now multiply that by 3 billion nucleotides in a human, and 70(?) days to replace all the cells in your body. Most of the time, the mtuation is fatal and the cell dies. Most of the rest of the time, it does nothing at all. Once in a while, you get a mutation that is actually beneficial. And once in a while, that mutation happens to occur in gamates, so it actually gets passed on to children. That's clearly what happened in this case.
the case of David Crohn [pbs.org] and others who lack secondary CCR5 (for macrophages) or CXCR4 (for T-cells) receptors and are thus resistant to HIV infection. NB: CCR5 and CXCR4 are believed to be secondary to the CD4 receptor, found on both cell types, in the HIV binding process.
The only novel thing about this discovery is that it was in Asians, vs. the Caucasian populations in which immunity had previously been reported (and I suppose African as well, even though the Kenyan prostitutes as referenced above turned out to not be immune). The article is pretty worthless, not even listing what the "mutant genes" are, but it's a pretty good guess that CCR5 and/or CXCR4 is involved.
Even the statement about putting the "gene" in the vagina or rectum is not new: see microbicides [google.com].
Just a word to the wise, news like this will rarely, if ever, scoop a scientific publication in Science or Nature. If the discoveries truly have any scientific merit whatsoever, you'll more likely read about it in these journals or the media commotion stirred by these publications. In other words, unless somewhere in the article is says "results of these studies published in the journal [place name of journal here]," the results have not been peer reviewed. Therefore, "there's nothing to see here, move on."
I'm just glad to know SOMEONE will survive if this thing ever becomes airborne. LOL! Three Chinese chicks and a guy in Aboriginal Australia will recreate the human race. Boy, is our species in for a ride!
... in a different way. Check these "news" from July 2, 1998:
Geneva - Researchers have uncovered unusual behaviors of human immune systems that seem to have protected certain babies in Canada [aegis.com], prostitutes in Thailand [aegis.com] and Africa, and gay men in San Francisco from HIV, despite exposure to the AIDS virus.
The protections do not appear to be genetic, and may offer some critical clues to those hoping to make a vaccine against HIV.
At Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto, Dr. Kelly MacDonald and a team of pediatricians noticed something odd earlier this year: HIV-positive mothers did not pass the virus to babies who were born with immunologically incompatible blood. In cases of incompatibility, the mother has one genetic type of immune system markers, and the baby a different set. This can put the baby at risk of being attacked by the mother's immune system.
But, in the case of HIV-infected mothers, this immunological incompatibility saved the babies from HIV, MacDonald reported yesterday. The finding was based on a study of 111 mother / child pairs.
MacDonald believes that a key factor in the babies' genetic makeup - called A2/A6802 supertype - by fortunate coincidence prevents HIV from infecting the child. When the mother and child share the same genetic makeup in their immune system, MacDonald discovered, the child is 2.63 times more likely to get infected with HIV.
Since approximately 40 percent of the population worldwide has the A2/A6802 supertype, it makes it an attractive target for vaccine design, MacDonald said.
The U. S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention studied 280 prostitutes in Thailand who had worked in brothels for three years or more, and a group of non-prostitute Thai women. Not surprisingly, the prostitutes were far more likely to be infected with the virus, and 47 percent were HIV-positive, the CDC reported yesterday.
Remarkably, however, nine of the prostitutes were negative for HIV, even though they had genital herpes [aegis.com] and syphilis - clear indications of unsafe sexual behavior. The women did not have any of the genetic mutations that have been shown to protect some Caucasians from HIV. But they did apparently have complete immunity. Cells of their immune systems were killing every HIV to which they were exposed, the CDC team discovered. And laboratory studies revealed that their CD8 T-cells, a type of white blood cell, were secreting a factor which, when mixed in a petri dish with human cells and HIV, stimulated immune cells to destroy the virus.
Dr. Jay Levy of the University of California in San Francisco has presented evidence of a CD8-produced factor that stops HIV, as well. For years he has tried to isolate the mysterious substance, to no avail. But it could result, he said in a speech, in a way to maintain control of the virus without the need for antiviral drugs.
Sharon Stranford, a researcher in Levy's laboratory, examined the immune system cells of gay San Francisco men who have been exposed repeatedly to HIV and never become infected. She said that the CD8 cells in these men make a mysterious factor that protects against HIV. But it is not the same as the one discovered in Thai prostitutes, Stranford said, because it blocks HIV without prompting immune system cells to kill the virus. It works by blocking the ability of HIV to make copies of itself, Levy said.
Finally, a CDC team working in Abijan, Ivory Coast [aegis.com], has also found a group of uninfected prostitutes. They, too, lack any genetic protection. And their ability to fight off HIV is also immunological. The team hasn't yet worked out the details, researchers said, but it is clear that immune system cells in the African prostitutes are highly activated, as if constantly ready to go to war.
First, it's been know for ages, so it's not a new mutation.
The specific 'mutation' involve CCR5, a coreceptor of HIV-1. An uncommun deletion called CCR5delta32 make it so that M-tropic HIV-1 can't enter CCR5+ cells in homozygote individuals (2 copies of the mutant gene). Heterozygotes (having a functional CCR5 and a mutated one) show less resistance to infection (70% resistance, estimated).
HIV-1 can exhibit a tropism (T-tropic) for another coreceptor, CXCR4, for which no mutation is known, so total immunity isn't exact; we can talk about resistance at best. M-tropic viruses are associated with de novo infection, and a switch to T-tropism is thought to be a turning point in the degeneration to AIDS (but not always).
Even CCR5delta32 individuals can be infected (althought have far less risk than you and me). Even then, the infection progress far more slowly than in normal individuals... they're called long term non-progressors. Won't develop AIDS in their lifetime, but still infectious, which can be dangerous...
The women are more than likely "resistant" to HIV infection, not "immune" to it. While colloquially, the two terms may mean the same thing, the term "immune" suggests that they can't be infected by HIV because their immune system recognizes and destroys the virus. "Resistance" works by some mechanism other than an immune response.
About ten years ago, I did volunteer work for an HIV-testing clinic. I met two men while I was there who were convinced that they were both HIV-immune. One had been very sexually active during the late 70s and early 80s and had had most of his friends and sexual partners die of AIDS-related causes, and the other had repeatedly had sex with multiple HIV-positive partners out of survivors guilt. Talk was just beginning around then of people who seemed to be immune to HIV.
It's not something I'd especially want to gamble on, though - HIV mutates nearly every time it infects, and at some point I think these people who are now immune won't be immune any longer.
The main story and your post put me in mind of a particular episode of "Secrets of the Dead" that I saw, exploring the plague and its survivors.
I wonder if either of those fellows could have been carriers of the delta 32 gene, a mutated form of the gene CCR5:
"In 1996, research showed that delta 32 prevents HIV from entering human cells and infecting the body"
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/case_plague/
I didn't see in the article anywhere where it mentioned which gene was affected in the Chinese women, but it seems like to be a different one, based on the information presented in the "Secrets" show:
"O'Brien assembled an international team of scientists to test for the presence of delta 32 around the world. "Native Africans did not have delta 32 at all," O'Brien says, "and when we looked at East Asians and Indians, they were also flat zero." In fact, the levels of delta 32 found in Eyam were only matched in regions of Europe that had been affected by the plague and in America, which was, for the most part, settled by European plague survivors and their descendents."
It was a really good show and if you get the opportunity to watch it, I highly recommend that you do.
In Zhu's opinion, if medicine functioning similarly with the genes was put in the vagina and rectum, the HIV virus couldn't find its carrier to enter the human body and thus would be expelled.
Does this make sense to anyone? Granted, these are the reporter's words, not the doctor's words... but that just doesn't sound logical to me. The virus is there, in contact with this "medicine" and your own cells. Because of the medicine's structure, the virus can't affect it, but how does that help your own cells, which do NOT have that protection?
Frankly, the simple (but often unused/misused) "condom" solution seems easier in this example then the medicine he's talking about.
Much of the AIDS epidemic in Africa is directly caused by people misunderstanding how the virus is transmitted and treated (no, sex with virgins or babies won't help you), due in some cases to the sheer stupidity of certain leaders ("HIV does NOT cause AIDS"), poor education programs, and the equally stupid refusal of certain other religious-minded leaders who refuse to support programs that advocate anything other than celibacy to prevent STDs. Madness.
I hope that at a minimum, China is putting some serious resources into educating their population about how HIV/AIDS works, and how to avoid getting it. Obviously that's not the end of the battle, but it's the basic starting point.
Now they can mess around all they want, au natural, and not worry about dying!
Indeed! Now all they have to worry about is... Gohnorrea Herpes Chlamydia Syphillis Ge nital Warts HPV Hepatitus Trichomoniasis and more! Lucky bitches...
Indeed! Now all they have to worry about is... Gohnorrea Herpes Chlamydia Syphillis Ge nital Warts HPV Hepatitus Trichomoniasis and more! Lucky bitches...
In order....
Curable. Nasty stuff, but not fatal. Curable. Curable. Nasty stuff, once again not fatal. Nasty stuff, not fatal unless it causes cancer. Possibly fatal. Nasty stuff, but curable.
HIV is the queen mother of STDs, once that is out of the way, there will be a lot more au naturale love happening in the world.
In my experience, a related condition, "marriage", seems to have a similar effect in reducing the frequency of sexual activity. So much so, in fact, that I begin to believe that those who oppose homosexual activity would be well served to endorse gay marriage as a preventative measure.
I think it would be totally awesome if some kind of imaginary god did try and punish it's creation through the use of a cruel, life destroying virus - only to have his divine will deflected by something so simple as a tiny thicknesses of latex, education, testing and screening, as well as the hard work of doctors and scientists around the globe.
Would me wonder who should be quaking in fear from who.
I think that the existance of this mutation has been known for some time. The key is that it was only thought to exist in the caucasian population until now.
The key is the fact the Gene patens have blocked research into it. Every time a lab does something with the caucasian mutation this lab send out a cease and desist. They guy who they found it on originally is opposed to it, but he has no say, even if it is his body. Another thing software and genes have in common, neither should have patents.
"Before, such mutant genes were only found in Caucasians. The finding has encouraged us to do further research in China, with the aim of developing medicines to prevent and cure HIV/AIDS for different races,"said Zhu.
Sounds like some mutant genes have been found previously, so I am not sure if this will add any new information to the fight against AIDS.
China is now at a key moment in adopting effective measures to control and prevent HIV/AIDS as the disease moves from high risk populations to the general population, in most cases though sexual transmission, Zhu pointed out.
China had better be prepared for a potential disaster. Even if the presense of this "mutant" gene does lead to some sort of cure, it will probably take years to develop and test. In the meantime, China, along with most Middle Eastern and Asian countries, has a high risk of having an AIDS related disaster of a scope way beyond what we now see in Africa. We're talking tens of millions of people infected and/or dying all across the Middle East and Asia.
Very true, but keep in mind that this was not true immunity.
The original ~10 prostitutes found immune were then taken away from their constant exposure to HIV and some were put on antiretrovirlas. It was only after this removal that they began to progress to AIDS. There are several ways in which our body can outmaneuver HIV. This adaptive immune response is remarkable though I feel that the protein APOBEC3G is also worth mentioning.
APOBEC3G is an intracellular antiretoviral protein that "interferes with the replication of HIV by incorporating itself into virus particles and damaging the genetic material of the virus. The viral protein Vif can halt this process in two ways". Vif is one of atleast 15 proteins found in HIV's 9 definitive genes. For an interesting read:
http://www.retrovirology.com/content/1/1/28 [retrovirology.com]
That would be correct. The immunity has been known of for a few years. I'm sort of disappointed the article didn't make that clearer, or explain how it works at all.
My biology teacher covered it as part of our lesson on HIV, about 3 years ago. Basically, it has to do with the structure of their white blood cells. Specifically, they lack the CCR-5 protein for the virus to latch on to. The best part is that people can function just fine without this protein, so there don't appear to be any ill effects. The trick now is figuring out how to confer the immunity on those not born with it.
A simple search for "ccr-5" will give a whole bunch of articles for anyone who's interested.
"culturally Asians seem to be a lot less
promiscuous, which would imply that this
disaster doesn't seem so imminent"
This is so only to show others.
Asian culture is at its best in the sex scene.
On one hand, they will pretend that they are not sexually promiscuous, and on the other hand, the vast majority of Child Prostitution in the world happen throughout Asian countries. You can find child prostitutes in Indonesia, China, India, Kampuchia (formerly known as Cambodia), Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Taiwan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Hong Kong, The Philippines, Malaysia and so on.
If you are willing to pay, you can even participate in the "deflowering" act, where you'd get a virgin child - male or female - for his / her first night.
What you do to them, as long as you don't kill them, is entirely up to you.
I swear I saw a documentary on PBS about how a tiny percentage of mostly european descendants are immune and it was because of the Black Death (or Bubonic plague, I'm not sure that those are the same thing.) But googling for answers lead me to
this article [healthfinder.gov] which says that 10-15 percent of northern europeans have limited immunity due to inheriting 1 resistant gene and 1% inherited the gene from both parents giving them full immunity. And Swedes have the highest percentage. Also it says the Plague is debunked and suggests the everpresent Smallpox as the culprit.
Just curious, then, where does that put bisexuals?
No one knows, but it doesn't seem to be linked to morphological differences in the brain. And I doubt we'll find out any time soon, since bisexuals are generally treated as deviants by both hetero- and homosexuals (except when it's part of some straight guy's "bi-babe" fantasy).
Not to be harsh, but you can get the same thing with heart problems. I mowed lawns in high school - one afternoon I mowed the lawn of a little old lady. That night, my dad came home and said that she had just died of a heart attack. She looked fine that afternoon, but that night she was dead.
Same goes for any kind of cancer - it can insidiously grow in you until there's nothing you can do about it but waste away and die.
Probably going to burn some karma with those comments, but it's a terrible disease that they're working on. I hope they find a cure and kick its ass - same for cancer - but it's just another way to die.
In other words, you must have a pathetically weak immune system (or none at all), and your body's cells must be so fragile that any abnormality of any kind will destroy them instantly.
A small fraction of people seems to be resistant to HIV infection because they carry idiosyncratic mutations that interfere with the way the HIV virus works. That doesn't mean they have a "pathetically weak immune system"; in fact, such mutations generally have no known effects at all other than conferring HIV resistance. Furthermore, resistance of some fraction of the population to specific viruses is a common occurrence.
But, hey, if that's what these two women want for their life, that's their problem.
WTF is that supposed to mean? One of the women in question was exposed to HIV from her husband, who was infected through a blood transfusion. It's bad enough that bigoted right wingers confuse stupidity and carelessness (unprotected sex) with immorality, but now people like you even consider accidentally getting a tainted blood transfusion a lifestyle choice and a moral failing?
I think you demonstrate just how absurd your kinds of views are, and the blithering nonsense that preceded it showed how uninformed you are.
Hmmm...Is the parent a nice molecular-biology troll or just a gem of ignorance mixed with self-confidence?
"Because there's very little in the virus that is guaranteed to be common to ALL instances of said virus, it is hard to see how immunity could exist, even in theory."
The resistance mutation depends from the absence of a particular chemokine receptor on human white blood cells. In principle, the HIV virus could use another receptor to enter. In practice it's quite improbable the virus can mutate his whole capsid proteins to get advantage of a totally new receptor.
"Then, you have other problems. HIV is detected in a number of ways, but probably the most common way is to detect the antibodies to the virus. This causes an obvious problem. If your immune system is damaged, in some way, it may not be able to detect the virus and/or produce antibodies to it. Either way, any technique for detecting HIV through the antibodies would fail."
You obviously have no grasp of immunology. HIV infects primarily subsets of T cells. They are not B cells, that produce soluble antibodies. B cells are not attacked by HIV,therefore you argument is bullshit.
(In fact, B cells are indirectly affected by HIV [sciencedaily.com], but only in late stages of AIDS disease.)
"So much so that they could fight the disease and not even need to generate antibodies to do so."
You have no grasp of immunology,it's obvious now. Your body doesn't "feel the need" for antibodies.It just produces them when encounters an antigen. In fact, you probably already have cells with anti-HIV antibodies: they're just very,very few and are not activated.(Wanna know why? RTFM, i.e. a molecular immunology textbook)
"In theory, since we don't actually know in practice."
We know. Check other/. comments and what I wrote before.
"Provided the self-destruct triggers faster than the virus can spread"
It seems you know nothing about virology and apoptosis too...
"...you're probably not going to live very long anyway, and your quality of life isn't going to be noticably better than those with the disease. In fact, it would probably be a whole lot worse.
But, hey, if that's what these two women want for their life, that's their problem.
"
If these women were immunodeficient, physicians should have noticed it immediately. Such a severe immunodeficience is, like you seem to understand, practically incompatible with life.
Umm no.
Grab an Immunology text and get busy.
HIV begins by infecting CCR5+ CXCR4+ CD4+ T cells. B cells are the cells that produce antibodies, not T cells. Early in infection T-h cells are capable of activating B cells, with a corresponding increase of cytokine production (partially responsible for the early "flu" symptoms associated with infection). Early in infection there is a sharp increase in circulating IgG and IgA, so an ELISA/Western blot test for circulating antibodies is certainly justified.
How would a body fight HIV. Well even late infection, CD8+ cytotoxic T lymphocytes are still present, albeit in an impaired state due to an impaired generative ability. So, your body can still kill HIV infected cells. This does not even take into account the role of the complement pathway, which will be active at least through mid stage infection, and late stage in some patients.
The immune system collapse is due to a loss of Th cells, which are required to modulate the B cell response, and of course Th cytokines are absolutely essential for the functioning of the rest of the immune system. Without these cells, the immune system doesn't do much, let alone fight itself. Where are all the deaths from anaphylaxis, and other hyper immune responses?
The way that people are immune to HIV involves HIV entry into Th cells. Individuals with either a modified CCR5 or CXCR4 surface molecule do not support normal HIV entry into T cells. So, no entry, no infection. For your apoptosis suggestion, first learn exactly what apoptosis involves, and how viral replication works. If a cell goes apoptotic with even a few assembled viruses in its cytosol, they will spread.
You must have a pathetically weak knowledge of the iummune system (or none at all).
Genome sequencing of different isolates of HIV-1 and HIV-2 shows that each is related to retroviruses that occur in primates in Africa. These are designated simian immunodeficiency viruses (SIV) although they do not cause immune deficiency (or any disease) in their natural host. However, on those occasions when a SIV accidentally infects a primate of a different species, it does cause disease in the new host. The human epidemic is one example. HIV-1 is most closely related to a SIV found in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes troglodytes) HIV-2 is most closely related to a SIV that occurs in the sooty mangabey (Cercocebus atys). Genome analysis also permits the construction of phylogenetic trees which reveal different clades of HIV just as such analysis reveals evolutionary relationship between species.
You are indeed correct. In fact I've been able to replicate the chemical compound in my basement wet lab, but lack the funds for commercialization. Please send a check to my Nigerian account so I can continue with my research.
I assume by this you're referring to the federal government's "ban" on certain types of research, such as stem cell reasearch... only there is no such ban. You can do all the research with any type of stem cells you want (including those from aborted fetuses) and not break a single law... you just can't do it using money from the federal government.
While whether or not such research should have access to federal funds is debatable (and I'd probably agree that the current regulations are too restrictive), it's a far cry from actually banning such research.
One useful statistic that I've never come across is the relative ammounts of research funding spent in the U.S. by private vs. public/government sources.
Great, two hot Chinese women whose 'superpowers' are that they can fuck anyone and inject any needle without being harmed. I guess it was about time X-Men went hentai and became XXX-Men.
I'm imagining them in the leather bodysuits from the movies, but crotchless and with a opening at the elbows for shooting up. Their arch-nemesis shall be Donkey Boy and Heroin Girl.
Oh god, what kind of pathetic geek am I? I just turned an important piece of AIDS research that could help millions into a bad porno comic joke... I will log off before I embarrass myself further.
If you need me, I will be in my bedroom, masturbating...
You need to correct that even further. A greater NUMBER of people will die in the third-world, but even there, AIDS deaths are a very small PROPORTION of total deaths. People in the third-world are still dying from the "basics" - Hunger, Poverty, Diaorrhea, Cholera, TB, Malaria, e.t.c. Civilisation will end when we acknowledge George Bush as our Anointed God-On-Earth and (Shudder, Shiver) start pasting "What would W do?" on our car bumpers.
I've heard figures that around 1/3 of the total population of some African countries are HIV positive. Granted, a bunch will get picked off by something else before AIDS has a chance to get them, but it's still a significant proportion. Besides, most AIDS-related deaths aren't due to the virus itself, but rather it weakening your immune system enough for something else to get you.
You've picked a few African countries, and you're most likely correct about them. But I've used the blanket term Third-World - in response to the post above mine), which includes India and China (that's a minimum of 2 Billion people. AIDS prevalence in this entire group is much, much less than 1%). But starvation/malnutrition, and the other diseases I've mentioned are at least 10%. I think the priorties there are clear. Most western agencies, when talking about India and China always mention figures, but they neve talk about percentages. In India, according to official figures there are meant to 0.5 million people suffering from AIDs, and think it's double that in China, of course, these official figures are usually crap... however, let's assume they're double that number, that still is nothing compared to the number of people dying from other diseases/afflictions.
I think it is time to officially retire the term "third world" since hardly anyone has a clue what it means and keeps making up their own definitions. I have to admit that including a communist country with nuclear weapons is the most imaginitive inclusion in the "third world" I've yet to see. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_world [wikipedia.org]
HIV is the virus, AIDS is the symptoms.
No you can never directly die from HIV, HIV only infects CD4 positive cells; ie, T-Helper Cells. Unfortunatly T-Helper Cells are nessecary for an active responsive immune system, without it, you quickly succumb to a multitude of usually harmless diseases that can kill, eg herpes...
some countries in africa the possibility of contracting HIV during your lifetime is now nearly 100% for teenagers.
If they were male (Score:5, Funny)
Genetics at work? (Score:5, Interesting)
Just my first thoughts on the subject. I would like to know more about the study.
Re:Genetics at work? (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't think that's exactly the case. HIV is only twenty-five years old, which certainly isn't enough time for genetic evolution to take place (especially considering the relatively slow reporductive rate of humans).
It's more likely they've an odd mutant gene that by coincadence makes them immune to the virus.
Parent
Re:Genetics at work? (Score:5, Informative)
HIV is most certainly NOT only 25 years old.
It's extremely old, they have preserved tissue samples from almost 50 years ago or so that have been found to contain the virus (the subject died in exactly the same way as the first cases presented here)
(an english sailor died of a oppertunistic diseases, and after he died, tissue was preserved for later study.)
The event that has made HIV into a new epidemic is massive changes in social morality. Originally, HIV was called the Gay-Related immuno-deficiency syndrome or somesuch, because it was primarily affecting people who were outwardly gay.
Of course, it turned out that these people were just starting to be very broad in their choice of partners, and of course, people were starting to share needles for drug use.
ashridah
Parent
Re:Genetics at work? (Score:5, Insightful)
Perhaps you could explain how this observation works with the fact that the most virulent New World disease (Syphilis) managed to spread like wildfire from Catholic Spain at the height of the Inquisition, throughout European society. And while you're at it, perhaps you could explain how it was still a significant and common disease at the height of the Victorian period.
Maybe I'll save you the effort. Both Syphilis and HIV/AIDS were enabled by revolutions in *Human Mobility*, not changes in morality. The syphilis epidemic erupted at the same time that commerce via ship hit a spike, and HIV/AIDS hit us when air travel spiked.
It's no surprise that 'Patient Zero' in the US HIV/AIDS outbreak was an airline steward. It *is* a coincidence that he happened to be gay.
Parent
Re:Genetics at work? (Score:5, Informative)
Mutations happen all the time - 0.0000000000000214/nucleotide/generation according to these guys [nih.gov]. Now multiply that by 3 billion nucleotides in a human, and 70(?) days to replace all the cells in your body. Most of the time, the mtuation is fatal and the cell dies. Most of the rest of the time, it does nothing at all. Once in a while, you get a mutation that is actually beneficial. And once in a while, that mutation happens to occur in gamates, so it actually gets passed on to children. That's clearly what happened in this case.
Parent
Virtual Light (Score:5, Interesting)
Not really news (Score:5, Informative)
The only novel thing about this discovery is that it was in Asians, vs. the Caucasian populations in which immunity had previously been reported (and I suppose African as well, even though the Kenyan prostitutes as referenced above turned out to not be immune). The article is pretty worthless, not even listing what the "mutant genes" are, but it's a pretty good guess that CCR5 and/or CXCR4 is involved.
CCR5delta32 is probably the mutant gene (Score:5, Informative)
Even the statement about putting the "gene" in the vagina or rectum is not new: see microbicides [google.com].
Just a word to the wise, news like this will rarely, if ever, scoop a scientific publication in Science or Nature. If the discoveries truly have any scientific merit whatsoever, you'll more likely read about it in these journals or the media commotion stirred by these publications. In other words, unless somewhere in the article is says "results of these studies published in the journal [place name of journal here]," the results have not been peer reviewed. Therefore, "there's nothing to see here, move on."
Parent
immunity? someone should research slashdot (Score:5, Funny)
Glad to know (Score:5, Funny)
seen this immunity before... (Score:5, Informative)
Geneva - Researchers have uncovered unusual behaviors of human immune systems that seem to have protected certain babies in Canada [aegis.com], prostitutes in Thailand [aegis.com] and Africa, and gay men in San Francisco from HIV, despite exposure to the AIDS virus.
The protections do not appear to be genetic, and may offer some critical clues to those hoping to make a vaccine against HIV.
At Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto, Dr. Kelly MacDonald and a team of pediatricians noticed something odd earlier this year: HIV-positive mothers did not pass the virus to babies who were born with immunologically incompatible blood. In cases of incompatibility, the mother has one genetic type of immune system markers, and the baby a different set. This can put the baby at risk of being attacked by the mother's immune system.
But, in the case of HIV-infected mothers, this immunological incompatibility saved the babies from HIV, MacDonald reported yesterday. The finding was based on a study of 111 mother / child pairs.
MacDonald believes that a key factor in the babies' genetic makeup - called A2/A6802 supertype - by fortunate coincidence prevents HIV from infecting the child. When the mother and child share the same genetic makeup in their immune system, MacDonald discovered, the child is 2.63 times more likely to get infected with HIV.
Since approximately 40 percent of the population worldwide has the A2/A6802 supertype, it makes it an attractive target for vaccine design, MacDonald said.
The U. S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention studied 280 prostitutes in Thailand who had worked in brothels for three years or more, and a group of non-prostitute Thai women. Not surprisingly, the prostitutes were far more likely to be infected with the virus, and 47 percent were HIV-positive, the CDC reported yesterday.
Remarkably, however, nine of the prostitutes were negative for HIV, even though they had genital herpes [aegis.com] and syphilis - clear indications of unsafe sexual behavior. The women did not have any of the genetic mutations that have been shown to protect some Caucasians from HIV. But they did apparently have complete immunity. Cells of their immune systems were killing every HIV to which they were exposed, the CDC team discovered. And laboratory studies revealed that their CD8 T-cells, a type of white blood cell, were secreting a factor which, when mixed in a petri dish with human cells and HIV, stimulated immune cells to destroy the virus.
Dr. Jay Levy of the University of California in San Francisco has presented evidence of a CD8-produced factor that stops HIV, as well. For years he has tried to isolate the mysterious substance, to no avail. But it could result, he said in a speech, in a way to maintain control of the virus without the need for antiviral drugs.
Sharon Stranford, a researcher in Levy's laboratory, examined the immune system cells of gay San Francisco men who have been exposed repeatedly to HIV and never become infected. She said that the CD8 cells in these men make a mysterious factor that protects against HIV. But it is not the same as the one discovered in Thai prostitutes, Stranford said, because it blocks HIV without prompting immune system cells to kill the virus. It works by blocking the ability of HIV to make copies of itself, Levy said.
Finally, a CDC team working in Abijan, Ivory Coast [aegis.com], has also found a group of uninfected prostitutes. They, too, lack any genetic protection. And their ability to fight off HIV is also immunological. The team hasn't yet worked out the details, researchers said, but it is clear that immune system cells in the African prostitutes are highly activated, as if constantly ready to go to war.
Immunity? (Score:5, Informative)
The specific 'mutation' involve CCR5, a coreceptor of HIV-1. An uncommun deletion called CCR5delta32 make it so that M-tropic HIV-1 can't enter CCR5+ cells in homozygote individuals (2 copies of the mutant gene). Heterozygotes (having a functional CCR5 and a mutated one) show less resistance to infection (70% resistance, estimated).
HIV-1 can exhibit a tropism (T-tropic) for another coreceptor, CXCR4, for which no mutation is known, so total immunity isn't exact; we can talk about resistance at best. M-tropic viruses are associated with de novo infection, and a switch to T-tropism is thought to be a turning point in the degeneration to AIDS (but not always).
Even CCR5delta32 individuals can be infected (althought have far less risk than you and me). Even then, the infection progress far more slowly than in normal individuals... they're called long term non-progressors. Won't develop AIDS in their lifetime, but still infectious, which can be dangerous...
Immunity (Score:5, Funny)
I personally plan to remain vulnerable. Alas.
resistant, not immune (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Spontaneous mutation? (Score:5, Interesting)
It's not something I'd especially want to gamble on, though - HIV mutates nearly every time it infects, and at some point I think these people who are now immune won't be immune any longer.
Parent
Delta 32 (Score:5, Interesting)
I wonder if either of those fellows could have been carriers of the delta 32 gene, a mutated form of the gene CCR5:
"In 1996, research showed that delta 32 prevents HIV from entering human cells and infecting the body"
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/case_plague/
I didn't see in the article anywhere where it mentioned which gene was affected in the Chinese women, but it seems like to be a different one, based on the information presented in the "Secrets" show:
"O'Brien assembled an international team of scientists to test for the presence of delta 32 around the world. "Native Africans did not have delta 32 at all," O'Brien says, "and when we looked at East Asians and Indians, they were also flat zero." In fact, the levels of delta 32 found in Eyam were only matched in regions of Europe that had been affected by the plague and in America, which was, for the most part, settled by European plague survivors and their descendents."
It was a really good show and if you get the opportunity to watch it, I highly recommend that you do.
Parent
Dubious Science (Score:5, Funny)
In Zhu's opinion, if medicine functioning similarly with the genes was put in the vagina and rectum, the HIV virus couldn't find its carrier to enter the human body and thus would be expelled.
Does this make sense to anyone? Granted, these are the reporter's words, not the doctor's words... but that just doesn't sound logical to me. The virus is there, in contact with this "medicine" and your own cells. Because of the medicine's structure, the virus can't affect it, but how does that help your own cells, which do NOT have that protection?
Frankly, the simple (but often unused/misused) "condom" solution seems easier in this example then the medicine he's talking about.
Much of the AIDS epidemic in Africa is directly caused by people misunderstanding how the virus is transmitted and treated (no, sex with virgins or babies won't help you), due in some cases to the sheer stupidity of certain leaders ("HIV does NOT cause AIDS"), poor education programs, and the equally stupid refusal of certain other religious-minded leaders who refuse to support programs that advocate anything other than celibacy to prevent STDs. Madness.
I hope that at a minimum, China is putting some serious resources into educating their population about how HIV/AIDS works, and how to avoid getting it. Obviously that's not the end of the battle, but it's the basic starting point.
Parent
Re:Lucky ladies! (Score:5, Insightful)
Indeed! Now all they have to worry about is...
Gohnorrea
Herpes
Chlamydia
Syphillis
G
HPV
Hepatitus
Trichomoniasis
and more! Lucky bitches...
Parent
Re:Lucky ladies! (Score:5, Informative)
Gohnorrea
Herpes
Chlamydia
Syphillis
G
HPV
Hepatitus
Trichomoniasis
and more! Lucky bitches...
In order....
Curable.
Nasty stuff, but not fatal.
Curable.
Curable.
Nasty stuff, once again not fatal.
Nasty stuff, not fatal unless it causes cancer.
Possibly fatal.
Nasty stuff, but curable.
HIV is the queen mother of STDs, once that is out of the way, there will be a lot more au naturale love happening in the world.
LK
Parent
Just like Password (Score:5, Funny)
Herpes....
Chlamydia....
Syphilli
Genital Warts...
HPV....
Hepatitus...
Trichomoniasis..
I know! Things the average Slashdotter won't ever have to worry about.
ding ding ding
Parent
Re:Lucky ladies! (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Lucky ladies! (Score:5, Informative)
Trust me, that abrupt "stoppage" usually lasts much, much longer than nine months...
Parent
Re:Lucky ladies! (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Lucky ladies! (Score:5, Insightful)
I think it would be totally awesome if some kind of imaginary god did try and punish it's creation through the use of a cruel, life destroying virus - only to have his divine will deflected by something so simple as a tiny thicknesses of latex, education, testing and screening, as well as the hard work of doctors and scientists around the globe.
Would me wonder who should be quaking in fear from who.
Parent
Re:Immune (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Patents are the real key (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Immune (Score:5, Informative)
From the article
"Before, such mutant genes were only found in Caucasians. The finding has encouraged us to do further research in China, with the aim of developing medicines to prevent and cure HIV/AIDS for different races,"said Zhu.Sounds like some mutant genes have been found previously, so I am not sure if this will add any new information to the fight against AIDS.
China is now at a key moment in adopting effective measures to control and prevent HIV/AIDS as the disease moves from high risk populations to the general population, in most cases though sexual transmission, Zhu pointed out.China had better be prepared for a potential disaster. Even if the presense of this "mutant" gene does lead to some sort of cure, it will probably take years to develop and test. In the meantime, China, along with most Middle Eastern and Asian countries, has a high risk of having an AIDS related disaster of a scope way beyond what we now see in Africa. We're talking tens of millions of people infected and/or dying all across the Middle East and Asia.
Parent
Re:Immune (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Immune (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:Immune (Score:5, Informative)
My biology teacher covered it as part of our lesson on HIV, about 3 years ago. Basically, it has to do with the structure of their white blood cells. Specifically, they lack the CCR-5 protein for the virus to latch on to. The best part is that people can function just fine without this protein, so there don't appear to be any ill effects. The trick now is figuring out how to confer the immunity on those not born with it.
A simple search for "ccr-5" will give a whole bunch of articles for anyone who's interested.
Parent
Come to Asia and taste it, buddy ! (Score:5, Informative)
You sez:
"culturally Asians seem to be a lot less
promiscuous, which would imply that this
disaster doesn't seem so imminent"
This is so only to show others.
Asian culture is at its best in the sex scene.
On one hand, they will pretend that they are not sexually promiscuous, and on the other hand, the vast majority of Child Prostitution in the world happen throughout Asian countries. You can find child prostitutes in Indonesia, China, India, Kampuchia (formerly known as Cambodia), Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Taiwan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Hong Kong, The Philippines, Malaysia and so on.
If you are willing to pay, you can even participate in the "deflowering" act, where you'd get a virgin child - male or female - for his / her first night.
What you do to them, as long as you don't kill them, is entirely up to you.
Parent
There are asian sluts out there, believe me. (Score:5, Funny)
Being turned down by asian chicks doesn't mean asian cultures are less promiscuous
Parent
1 More Reason to Find Swedish Women Hot (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Not as interesting as it sounds... (Score:5, Interesting)
No one knows, but it doesn't seem to be linked to morphological differences in the brain. And I doubt we'll find out any time soon, since bisexuals are generally treated as deviants by both hetero- and homosexuals (except when it's part of some straight guy's "bi-babe" fantasy).
Max
Parent
Re:I hope this is true (Score:5, Interesting)
Same goes for any kind of cancer - it can insidiously grow in you until there's nothing you can do about it but waste away and die.
Probably going to burn some karma with those comments, but it's a terrible disease that they're working on. I hope they find a cure and kick its ass - same for cancer - but it's just another way to die.
Parent
otherwise completely normal (Score:5, Interesting)
A small fraction of people seems to be resistant to HIV infection because they carry idiosyncratic mutations that interfere with the way the HIV virus works. That doesn't mean they have a "pathetically weak immune system"; in fact, such mutations generally have no known effects at all other than conferring HIV resistance. Furthermore, resistance of some fraction of the population to specific viruses is a common occurrence.
But, hey, if that's what these two women want for their life, that's their problem.
WTF is that supposed to mean? One of the women in question was exposed to HIV from her husband, who was infected through a blood transfusion. It's bad enough that bigoted right wingers confuse stupidity and carelessness (unprotected sex) with immorality, but now people like you even consider accidentally getting a tainted blood transfusion a lifestyle choice and a moral failing?
I think you demonstrate just how absurd your kinds of views are, and the blithering nonsense that preceded it showed how uninformed you are.
Parent
Re:It seems unlikely. (Score:5, Informative)
Hmmm...Is the parent a nice molecular-biology troll or just a gem of ignorance mixed with self-confidence?
"Because there's very little in the virus that is guaranteed to be common to ALL instances of said virus, it is hard to see how immunity could exist, even in theory."
The resistance mutation depends from the absence of a particular chemokine receptor on human white blood cells. In principle, the HIV virus could use another receptor to enter. In practice it's quite improbable the virus can mutate his whole capsid proteins to get advantage of a totally new receptor.
"Then, you have other problems. HIV is detected in a number of ways, but probably the most common way is to detect the antibodies to the virus. This causes an obvious problem. If your immune system is damaged, in some way, it may not be able to detect the virus and/or produce antibodies to it. Either way, any technique for detecting HIV through the antibodies would fail."
You obviously have no grasp of immunology. HIV infects primarily subsets of T cells. They are not B cells, that produce soluble antibodies. B cells are not attacked by HIV,therefore you argument is bullshit.
(In fact, B cells are indirectly affected by HIV [sciencedaily.com], but only in late stages of AIDS disease.)
"So much so that they could fight the disease and not even need to generate antibodies to do so."
You have no grasp of immunology,it's obvious now. Your body doesn't "feel the need" for antibodies.It just produces them when encounters an antigen. In fact, you probably already have cells with anti-HIV antibodies: they're just very,very few and are not activated.(Wanna know why? RTFM, i.e. a molecular immunology textbook)
"In theory, since we don't actually know in practice."
We know. Check other /. comments and what I wrote before.
"Provided the self-destruct triggers faster than the virus can spread"
It seems you know nothing about virology and apoptosis too...
"...you're probably not going to live very long anyway, and your quality of life isn't going to be noticably better than those with the disease. In fact, it would probably be a whole lot worse. But, hey, if that's what these two women want for their life, that's their problem. "
If these women were immunodeficient, physicians should have noticed it immediately. Such a severe immunodeficience is, like you seem to understand, practically incompatible with life.
Parent
Re:It seems unlikely. (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:It seems unlikely. (Score:5, Informative)
Read this and learn: [rcn.com]
Origin of HIV
Genome sequencing of different isolates of HIV-1 and HIV-2 shows that each is related to retroviruses that occur in primates in Africa. These are designated simian immunodeficiency viruses (SIV) although they do not cause immune deficiency (or any disease) in their natural host. However, on those occasions when a SIV accidentally infects a primate of a different species, it does cause disease in the new host. The human epidemic is one example.
HIV-1 is most closely related to a SIV found in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes troglodytes)
HIV-2 is most closely related to a SIV that occurs in the sooty mangabey (Cercocebus atys).
Genome analysis also permits the construction of phylogenetic trees which reveal different clades of HIV just as such analysis reveals evolutionary relationship between species.
(emphasis mine)
Parent
Re:Conspiracy theory (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Darn! (Score:5, Interesting)
While whether or not such research should have access to federal funds is debatable (and I'd probably agree that the current regulations are too restrictive), it's a far cry from actually banning such research.
One useful statistic that I've never come across is the relative ammounts of research funding spent in the U.S. by private vs. public/government sources.
Parent
Re:Someone call... (Score:5, Funny)
I'm imagining them in the leather bodysuits from the movies, but crotchless and with a opening at the elbows for shooting up. Their arch-nemesis shall be Donkey Boy and Heroin Girl.
Oh god, what kind of pathetic geek am I? I just turned an important piece of AIDS research that could help millions into a bad porno comic joke... I will log off before I embarrass myself further.
If you need me, I will be in my bedroom, masturbating...
Parent
RTFA (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:Tell me it ain't so ! (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Tell me it ain't so ! (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Tell me it ain't so ! (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
um, no (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:Tell me it ain't so ! (Score:5, Insightful)
I think it is time to officially retire the term "third world" since hardly anyone has a clue what it means and keeps making up their own definitions. I have to admit that including a communist country with nuclear weapons is the most imaginitive inclusion in the "third world" I've yet to see.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_world [wikipedia.org]
Isn't it ironic?
Parent
Re:Tell me it ain't so ! (Score:5, Informative)
Parent