A New Method to Kill AIDS Virus
_________(46). But researchers won’’t know for a year or more whether it will work, scientist David Ho told journalists here Wednesday for the Fourth Conference in Viruses and Infections.
"This is a study that’’s in progress," said Ho, head of the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center, New York.
The study involves 20 people who started combinations of anti-HIV drugs very early in the course of the disease, within 90 days of their infections. They’’ve been treated for up to 18 months. Four others have dropped out because of side effects or problems complying with the exacting drug system.
The drugs have knocked the AIDS virus down to undetectable levels in the blood of all remaining patients. And, in the latest development, scientists have now tested lymph nodes (淋巴结) and semen (精液) from a few patients and found no virus reproducing there._________(47).
Ho has calculated that the drugs should be able to wipe out remaining viruses—at least from known reservoirs throughout the body—in two to three years._________(48). Oh Wednesday, Ho said he wouldn’t ask any patient to consider that step before 2.5 years of treatment.
And he emphasized that he is not urging widespread adoption of such early, aggressive treatment outside of trials._________(49).
_________(50). A federally funded study will put 300 patients on triple-drug treatments and then see if some responding well after six months can continue to suppress the virus on just one or two drugs, says researcher Douglas Richman of the University of California, San Diego. Some patients in that study also may be offered the chance to stop therapy after 18 months or more, he says.
A. The attempt to eradicate the AIDS virus continues to be hopeful.
B. But the only way to prove eradication would be to stop the drugs and see if the virus comes back.
C. But other scientists are looking at similar experiments.
D. Bear in mind that undetectable does not equal absent, Ho says.
E. No one knows the long-term risks.
F. A high-profile attempt to eradicate the AIDS virus in a few patients continues to show promise.