This month, great news hailing from Durban, South Africa where a study was conducted with the intention to find a cure for the HIV virus that has plagued the nation for centuries. The test that was carried out on a select number of individuals (both male and female) produced promising results that were declared in San Francisco, United States of America at the 2025 Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI.)
Known as the ‘combination immunotherapy,’ the trial aimed at erasing or reducing all traces of the HIV virus by administering strong immunity boosters that allowed the body’s immunity system to keep the virus in check, without the subject having to rely mainly on medication for the rest of their lives. The results showed promising results after 20% of the subjects remained off antiretroviral therapy even one and half years later after the trial.
“While this treatment approach didn’t work for most participants, it is still a significant development in HIV cure research. Studying how the 20% managed to control the virus on their own will help scientists develop better HIV cure strategies, as well as work out ways to improve future treatments,” said Professor Thumbi Ndung’u, director for basic & translational science at Africa Health Research Institute (AHRI) and a professor and Victor Daitz Chair at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.
This progress comes shortly after the Country’s recently released plan to put an additional 1.1 million South Africans living with HIV on life-saving treatment by the end of 2025. The discovery of a potential cure to the HIV virus will not only speed up the eradication of HIV and AIDs not only in South Africa but the whole of Africa aswell. With these new results from the trial Doctors believe that in the near future an Aids vaccine will be readily available on the market.
