Drug giant to keep fighting HIV

LONDON: Britain’s GlaxoSmithKline, which decided last week to retain rather than float off its HIV drugs business, is to collaborate with US scientists in developing a cure for HIV/Aids.

Until recently, many researchers were reluctant to even discuss the possibility of curing the disease caused by HIV, which infects 35 million people worldwide, since the obstacles seemed insurmountable. But after a 30-year battle to keep HIV at bay with lifetime antiretroviral drugs, there is growing optimism that a cure is feasible.

The case of Timothy Brown, the socalled “Berlin patient” whose HIV was eradicated by a complex treatment for leukaemia in 2007, marked the first cure and the science has been advancing since.

GlaxoSmithKline is tapping into the latest expertise by creating an HIV Cure centre with the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and establishing a new jointly owned company.

The drugmaker said yesterday that it would invest $20 million (R240m) to help fund the work for an initial five years.

Scientists will study various cure options, including a so-called “shock-and-kill” strategy developed at University of North Carolina, which unmasks dormant HIV hiding in white blood cells, so that it can be attacked by a boosted immune system.

It is likely to prove a long haul, however.

“In the next five to 10 years, we should gain more knowledge around the various mechanisms that could contribute to a cure and maybe in the next 10 to 20 years, we can really bring these modalities together,” said Zhi Hong, GSK’s head of infectious diseases.