HIV ABILITY TO CAUSE AIDS BECOMING WEAKER
The evolution of HIV has reduced its ability to cause Aids in patients, a study of more than 2,000 women in Africa has found.
Scientists believe a less virulent HIV could be one of a number of factors contributing to a turning of the deadly pandemic.
According to the report, developing resistance to patients' natural immunity is causing the virus to become less deadly.
Researchers, led by the University of Oxford, have declared the development is making "an important contribution" in the fight against HIV.
Widespread access to anti-retroviral drugs has also been slowing HIV's progress to Aids, the scientists found.
The research involved 2,000 women with chronic HIV infection in South Africa and Botswana - two of the countries among the worst affected.
The study looked at a gene that gives patients some protection against the effects of HIV.
In Botswana, the virus has adapted to resist that gene's immunity, but this evolution has led to a reduced ability to replicate. This means HIV has become less infectious and therefore takes longer to cause Aids.
In the second part of the study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers found that treating the sickest HIV patients, whose immune system had been weakened by the infection, with anti-retroviral therapy, accelerated the evolution of HIV variants with a weaker ability to replicate.
Scientists believe a less virulent HIV could be one of a number of factors contributing to a turning of the deadly pandemic.
According to the report, developing resistance to patients' natural immunity is causing the virus to become less deadly.
Researchers, led by the University of Oxford, have declared the development is making "an important contribution" in the fight against HIV.
Widespread access to anti-retroviral drugs has also been slowing HIV's progress to Aids, the scientists found.
The research involved 2,000 women with chronic HIV infection in South Africa and Botswana - two of the countries among the worst affected.
The study looked at a gene that gives patients some protection against the effects of HIV.
In Botswana, the virus has adapted to resist that gene's immunity, but this evolution has led to a reduced ability to replicate. This means HIV has become less infectious and therefore takes longer to cause Aids.
In the second part of the study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers found that treating the sickest HIV patients, whose immune system had been weakened by the infection, with anti-retroviral therapy, accelerated the evolution of HIV variants with a weaker ability to replicate.