New in HIV treatment

Immunologists have tried to achieve remission in HIV-infected patients with a cocktail of two antiviral antibodies. Antibody injections allowed trial participants to live 20 weeks without standard antiviral therapy and several more months without treatment at all. Most of the subjects then had to return to standard therapy, but in two people the remission lasted at least a year. Next, researchers will have to figure out exactly how antibodies affect the intact reservoir and look for a way to shrink it more - perhaps somehow combining antibodies with antiretroviral therapy.