We currently don’t have a surefire drug that would cure AIDS. So far, the best we could do is alleviate the symptoms and delay the spread. While these are considered positive solutions, the idea of an impending death is still present. Scientists have faced the fact that the search for a worthy and permanent cure for this immune malady has been unsuccessful yet there is still a light, one that is shining with a beam of hope. And our hero is unlikely, to say the least.
Researchers at the University College of London (UCL) and Scripps Research Institute state that our answers for killing AIDS can be found in the antibodies of South American animals. Llamas to be more exact. The road to find a cure for AIDS has been mostly trial and error but it seems that scientists have now found conclusive evidence in Llamas as their antibodies have a neutralizing effect on the HIV virus. The antibodies found in these animals are absent in humans and that does pose a problem, one that can be solved in time, if further tests are made. UCL lead researcher Dr. Laura McCoy, AIDS expert Robert Weiss, and llama antibody expert Theo Verrips discovered how a combination of four llama antibodies could manage to disarm 60 strains of AIDS. The beauty of their effectiveness lies in their specific roles in attacking separate parts of the virus: “This shows that immunization can induce potent and broadly neutralizing antibodies in llamas with features similar to human antibodies, and provide a framework to analyse the effectiveness of immunization protocols” says Dr. McCoy.
Of course, there’s the problem of successfuly administering a viable cure to a human, to which the scientists suggest a way in which the antibodies could be genetically engineered. Thus, our genes will have a chance at compatibility. There currently are 1.2 million infected people in the U.S, while on the globe we have a whopping 33 million individuals who suffer from this affliction. This may very well be a significant step forward in curing AIDS.