DRUG MIX SUCCESSFUL AT CLEARING AIDS VIRUS FROM LYMPH TISSUES.Byline: Shankar Vedantam Knight-Ridder Tribune News Wire Powerful new drugs are succeeding in removing the AIDS virus AIDS virus n. See HIV. from the heart of the human immune system immune system Cells, cell products, organs, and structures of the body involved in the detection and destruction of foreign invaders, such as bacteria, viruses, and cancer cells. Immunity is based on the system's ability to launch a defense against such invaders. - the lymph tissues where disease-fighting immune cells are stored, researchers reported Wednesday. The potent drug mixture already has proved capable of removing the virus from the blood of AIDS victims. Now the discovery of its power to cleanse the lymph system Lymph System When sickness or infection invades the body, the immune system is the first line of defense. A big part of that defense is the lymph system. Lymph is carried through the body by lymph vessels that have valves and muscles to help move the fluid. has brought researchers an important step closer to a cure for the disease. But researchers warned that the AIDS virus may be hiding in other hard-to-reach areas of the body, such as the brain and the genetic material of cells. ``There is very good news, but there are some caveats,'' said Anthony Fauci Anthony S. Fauci is an immunologist who has made substantial contributions to research in the areas of AIDS and other immunodeficiencies, both as a scientist and as the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). , the government's top scientist in the war against AIDS. Asked whether researchers could declare they had cured the disease, Fauci replied: ``absolutely not.'' Still, the research, published in the journals Science and Nature this week, highlights how rapidly the world of treatment has changed for the million-plus patients in America infected with the AIDS virus. The development of protease inhibitor protease inhibitor (prō`tē-ās'), any of a class of drugs that interfere with replication of the AIDS virus (HIV), by blocking an enzyme (protease) necessary in the late stages of its reproduction. drugs last year - and the discovery that their potency was enhanced when combined with an earlier class of drugs called reverse transcriptase inhibitors - meant that for the first time since the epidemic exploded in the early 1980s, patients can dare to hope. The first AIDS drug developed in 1986, AZT AZT or zidovudine (zīdō`vy  dēn'), drug used to treat patients infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which causes AIDS; also called , provoked a similar surge of hope, but it proved limited as the virus learned to get around the medicine. The new drug combination seems to be holding. Last year, scientists found the medicines were clearing the virus from patients' blood. Eliminating the virus from the lymph tissues, which store immune system cells that fight diseases, was regarded as the next hurdle. The virus ``clears more rapidly than we thought,'' said Ashley Haase, a microbiologist at the University of Minnesota (body, education) University of Minnesota - The home of Gopher. http://umn.edu/. Address: Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA. in Minneapolis and chief author of the paper in Science. ``That opens an opportunity for the immune system to heal itself.'' Within two days of treatment with the combination therapy, Haase said, half of the virus he found in 34 patients' lymph tissues had disappeared. ``In two weeks, another substantial portion had cleared; 99.9 percent of it was gone in a period of six months.'' |
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