Andrew Caldwell laughs at the idea he is brave. But taking part in groundbreaking clinical trials of regenerative medicine, the 35-year-old American underwent a bone marrow transplant and a punishing course of chemotherapy – all part of a novel process that might yet provide a cure for HIV.
“My goal was just being able to contribute towards the advancement of research for a cure in whatever capacity,” said Caldwell, a San Francisco-based operations manager who was diagnosed with HIV eight years ago.
Regenerative medicine makes use of human cells or tissues that are engineered in the lab or taken from donors.
It is the first time such trials have won state sanction in the United States, with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) hoping transformative treatments might later emerge.
The first generation of FDA-approved trials at clinics across the United States are examining the impact of stem cell, CAR-T cell and antibody therapies on patients with a host of conditions, ranging from HIV to brain cancer and lymphoma.
“I knew that this particular study wasn’t going to be the silver bullet…(but) I think it absolutely offers a lot of hope for a functional cure,” Caldwell told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in a phone interview.
The wait has already been long; this Wednesday’s World AIDS day marks 40 years since the virus was first identified.
Yet the speed with which science created vaccines for COVID-19 offers hope that a curative treatment for people living with HIV, along with preventative measures, might now emerge.
“The HIV community… really paid attention to how rapidly all things related to COVID, not just vaccinations, but treatments, clinical trials and other kinds of financial incentives, quickly came to be,” said Anthony Santella, professor of health administration and policy at the University of New Haven.
Such speed and skill in the face of COVID-19 are not free from controversy, Santella noted, given the relative inaction of governments in the early days of the AIDS pandemic in the 1980s.
“One could argue that if we put our money where our mouth is with HIV (in terms of) truly ending the epidemic worldwide, we wouldn’t be having the conversations about cure or vaccines… this would be a thing of the past,” he said.
ENDING DISEASE?
Caldwell’s story forms part of a 138-minute documentary – “Ending Disease” by Emmy Award-winning director Joe Gantz – released last month on streaming platforms.
The documentary follows the progress of patients at 10 U.S. clinic trials of regenerative medicine between 2016 and 2019.
For Caldwell and others living with HIV, the trials have real-life precedents, but more by accident than design.
In 2019, an HIV-positive man in Britain became the second known adult worldwide to be cleared of the virus after he received a bone marrow transplant from an HIV-resistant donor.
At the time, AIDS experts said the case was proof of the concept that scientists will one day be able to end the virus and marked a critical moment in the search for an HIV cure.
Research into stem cell treatment has further fanned hope.
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