The cure for cancer... is HIV? Can it be so simple?

[AK47]

Well, hope for the best ..

[Dolfagr]

How many times have we heard of cures? If it's really working, firstly it will cost a lot of money which most won't be able to aqquire and secondly pharmaceutical companies won't let it be distributed so they can keep making money.

[Mikal]

Hmmm.. I wonder if you can cure death with life. :trust:

[Alsatian]

Amazing to think that HIV, that has claimed so many lives, can later be modified to fight against another mass-killer.

[Dutchy]

Don't like to be the buggy wiseass, with a view at corpocracy, buuuuttt....



 :roll:

Same reason electricity, internet, fuel, media, etcetctec is free, transparent and open. If it would be, no money, no money, no life. A disastrous event like the plague, how utterly cold it may seem, is our only salvation to go into the nessesary degression, opposite of the 'infinite' eco, poli, soci growth that we've strifed for centuries. Earth isn't unlimited, our fantasy and imagination are. Not that they can't lead to reality and practise, as they do... Anyway, +1 science.

[Teddy]

How many times have we heard of cures? If it's really working, firstly it will cost a lot of money which most won't be able to aqquire and secondly pharmaceutical companies won't let it be distributed so they can keep making money.

Did you even watch the video? Pharmaceutical companies have nothing to do with it, it isn't a god damn pill lol. Watch the video before posting. If you had, you'd see its a process in which the patients own blood is taken, infected with HIV to teach the immune system's cells (white blood cells) to attack the cancer cells. These cells are then placed back into the patients. No pills, or crap needed.

Yes it costs a lot of money, $20,000.  My grandfather had open heart surgery last year and his bill was over $70,000. How much did he pay? Nothing. Its called insurance.

How many times have we heard of cures? Not many. None of them worked either in human trials, these are some of the first attempts in humans for a cure. In addition, the first attempt that WORKED.

Wasn't even that long of a video to watch, you should have and we both would have saved time.

[Driggz]

How many times have we heard of cures? If it's really working, firstly it will cost a lot of money which most won't be able to aqquire and secondly pharmaceutical companies won't let it be distributed so they can keep making money.

If you had a chance to cure a loved one of an aggressive cancer, would you really look at the price tag? I know I wouldn't. Like Teddy said, there is health insurance.
What is remarkable, is that it didn't take trial and error to for the HIV to kill the cancer.
The video is wonderful. It's an amazing thing to see a child that battled such a horrible disease, to get to live a normal and happy life.

[TheLegitHabibi]

Hmmmm. Ill tell you something
HIV cells are viruses which need to reproduce and survive. In a host, a human, they enter an immune cell, take over its genetic machinery and use it to reproduce. Then they leave the cells. Since they're inside the cells, immunity cell cannot find them. Now what happens is that when reproducing they cause HIV surface antigens to come on the surface of the cells. Basically, immune cells would now see these cells as threats and kill them. HIV by that time leaves the cell and the body ends up killing its own cells. The reproduced HIV go and attack other cells.

Cancer cells on the other hand are human cells with a malfunctioned nucleus. They're just like human cells except they keep on dividing uncontrollably, via mitosis. This continous growth damages everything around them. There's a subtle difference between cancer cells and human normal cells.


Now theoretically we can say that we can genetically modify HIV cells to target only cancer cells. This is a very very splendid method.

But... Its practically very very difficult.

1st thing 1st, we have to genetically modify the HIV to only and only attack the cancer cells. How do we do that. The HIV virus enters a cell using something called a CD4 receptor. And thats present on immune cells and thats why HIV enters them. How exactly will HIV target cancer cells.
Cells differentiate each other using surface receptors, which are kind of the same for both a unspecialized human cell and cancer cell.

The virus is also said to be genetically modified to not cause the disease. Still somewhat possible but again a difficult task to achieve.

Theoretically its very good. Practically, I think it will take around 10 years till we come close to using this method. Its not as easy as it sounds.

[[NP]Monte Montague]

No joke but I had this idea long ago, taking my inspiration from defibrillators which actually kill you.

[~Legend~]

Would be great if this had long term success.
We have never heard of absolute cures, just partial cures or those with a lot of potential to work. Some forms of cancer are less life threatening than others and 'cures' (or maybe better saying, medical techniques) exist to manage them.

[Teddy]

Would be great if this had long term success.
We have never heard of absolute cures, just partial cures or those with a lot of potential to work. Some forms of cancer are less life threatening than others and 'cures' (or maybe better saying, medical techniques) exist to manage them.

I recently found this, I guess it isn't perfect results yet... but they are working on it further. Even if the chance of success isn't 100% I would do it just to hope for that chance. Do keep in mind only 12 people have received this treatment. So it is still REALLY early in the process. These 12 people are people who had no other options and would eventually die and in a short period of time.

HIV helps save young cancer patient

[TheLegitHabibi]

Rigjt now they're only treating leukemia because thats a type of cancer involving white blood cells which HIV attacks.
Even if we succesfully create this genetically modified HIV, its only going to be for leukemia and not any other cancer.

[~Legend~]

I recently found this, I guess it isn't perfect results yet... but they are working on it further. Even if the chance of success isn't 100% I would do it just to hope for that chance. Do keep in mind only 12 people have received this treatment. So it is still REALLY early in the process. These 12 people are people who had no other options and would eventually die and in a short period of time.

Really interesting. Some of the newer advances in finding a cure for cancer have been very intuitive. Some of the 'cures' only seem to work for some of those affected, but that makes sense as cancer is not just one illness, but a wide range of different medical conditions.

[Teddy]

Rigjt now they're only treating leukemia because thats a type of cancer involving white blood cells which HIV attacks.
Even if we succesfully create this genetically modified HIV, its only going to be for leukemia and not any other cancer.

What is wrong with you people and not being able to watch videos before replying. They are training more than attacking Leukemia, they are training to attack cancer cells. This includes many forms of cancer...

[TheLegitHabibi]

What is wrong with you people and not being able to watch videos before replying. They are training more than attacking Leukemia, they are training to attack cancer cells. This includes many forms of cancer...

I saw the video man. Read my two posts.
This cure is only theoretic if you're aiming at other cancers. I dont think we're anywhere near that. We may be able to cure only leukemia with this. Which again may take a long time.

If you've studied biology you understand what Im tryna say. You just cant modify the HIV cell to go and target cancer cells in general. The situation is different with leukemia as HIV only attacks white blood cells.