AIDS: disappointment and hope

1993/10/01 Elhuyar Zientzia Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

• Osasuna

If we look at the news of the magazines, people have left the international meeting held in Berlin at the beginning of last June without great expectations. The results have been: there is nothing new and until 2000 no new vaccines or remedies are expected.

The truth is that so far in France the vaccine against HIV with people living with HIV was being tested. Also in the United States, the team of biologist Jonas Salk, who prepared an anti-polio vaccine, has released the “therapeutic” vaccine. The vaccines tested in 50 people with HIV have not yielded uniform results, but the immunization system is strengthened and the blood HIV rates decrease.

The group of Mr. Salk indicates that on the one hand, not all of us respond equally to this virus and on the other, they have had more relationship with HIV than seropositive ones.

The results are not entirely encouraging, but they can vary from person to person. In the field of the vaccine, the preparation of another for humans at the same level that protects monkeys does not seem to present insurmountable obstacles. To fight against the work of the virus for the deterioration of the immunization system, there is still a long way to investigate. Scientists already know how and why the immunization system is damaged.

In British Columbia, Canada, Hoffmann and Kion have shown that when a healthy mouse is injected the cells of another healthy mouse produces antibodies like when the HIV virus is introduced. They have been able to solve this mystery and the reason is that the virus mimics part of MHC of the antibody molecule. Therefore, the immunization cells of the human being are eliminated in the infection when there are CD4 lymphocytes. Protecting foreign MHC from the virus in your DNA appears as foreign cells for the defense system.

Currently, a line of research aims to disorder this section of MHC to prevent the destruction of lymphocytes, even if they are infected.

It is clear, therefore, that there are reasons to be encouraging.