Human Trials are Initiated to Find an HIV Cure

The pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) GSK will start to test their therapies on humans before it hits markets.

The UK-based pharmaceutical major GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) will initiate human trials as part of its efforts to find a cure for HIV. The planned clinical tests involving humans are considered to be ground-breaking trials.

In recent years, treatments against HIV have emerged which are allowing the affected persons to live a long life. However, the disease cannot be completely cured which forces millions of individuals around the world to live with HIV, which has been massively stigmatized.

AIDS - Initial Theories and Disease Progression-Blood Test-Stages-FAQs
AIDS was first detected in early 1980s, among gays, Haitians and black Africans. HIV is a descendant of a Simian Immunodeficiency Virus.

‘The drugs used by those who are at high risk due to close contact with HIV patients may replace the current requirement of taking daily pills.’

An estimated 38 million people globally were living with the disease in 2019, as per a recent Kaiser Family Foundation study.

Notably, GSK is one of the major players among drug companies that offer injection therapy for persons diagnosed with HIV instead of taking daily pills.

The pharmaceutical firm is reportedly working towards making its injection therapy longer-lasting, which could allow the patients to get injected only once in six months.

AIDS and Pregnancy - Treatment - Caring HIV Babies
The Acquired immune deficiency syndrome is brought about by the deadly human immunodeficiency virus. In the USA alone an estimate of 120,000 - 160,000 women are HIV- infected.

The company is also reportedly developing longer-active preventive drugs against HIV which can be administered at longer gaps.

GSK would reportedly start testing therapies on humans to wake up a latent HIV within people's immune cells. Once the virus is brought out, efforts would be directed towards neutralizing it.

Lab Test for AIDS/HIV
Describes how screening for HIV is performed in a laboratory.

"The idea is that you have to wake up the latent virus and try to get rid of it," quoted Dr. Kimberly Smith, head of research & development at GSK's HIV health division ViiV Healthcare, as saying.

The therapy, during the trials on non-human primates, was found to be successful in making the cells identify themselves.

World AIDS Day 2021—End Inequalities, End AIDS
Each year on 1st December, many organizations and individuals across the world come together to increase AIDS awareness and call for a move towards ending the HIV epidemic.

If it produces the desired results in humans during the trials, the next target would be to clear the virus after it has been induced.

Source-Medindia