Posts by Mourabit Halima

At the just concluded 25th International Conference on AIDS (AIDS2024), as a major clinical research progress of the conference, Dr. Christian Gaebler of Charlotte University in Berlin, Germany, reported the seventh "next Berlin patient" to be cured after the world's first "Berlin patient" cured of HIV. This patient did not follow the traditional path of achieving cure through homozygous CCR5 Δ 32/Δ 32 stem cell transplantation, but miraculously achieved sustained HIV remission without antiretroviral therapy (ART) for over five years after receiving heterozygous CCR5 WT/Δ 32 stem cell transplantation. Infectious Disease Frontier（IIDF） invited Dr. Christian Gaebler for an in-depth interview to elaborate on the significant implications behind this unprecedented successful case.

Broad spectrum neutralizing antibodies (bnAbs) are showing unprecedented potential in the field of HIV prevention and treatment. At the 25th International AIDS Conference (AIDS2024), Professor Hyman Scott, medical director of Bridge HIV clinical research, San Francisco Department of Public Health, introduced the latest progress of bnAbs in HIV prevention and treatment. Infectious Disease Frontier（IIDF） is honored to invite Professor Scott for an in-depth interview, elaborating on the important role of bnAbs in HIV prevention and treatment. Professor Scott pointed out that bnAbs provides a new option for people at high risk of HIV infection due to its convenience and efficient prevention ability of only requiring one injection every six months. By complementing existing antiretroviral therapies, bnAbs not only enriches prevention methods, but also opens up new pathways for the treatment of HIV infection. In the future, with the deepening of clinical development of bnAbs under the framework of HVTN/HPTN/IAVI cooperation, we are expected to witness the widespread application of this innovative therapy worldwide, bringing new hope to end the AIDS epidemic.

The 20th Shanghai International Forum for Infection Control (SIFIC), in conjunction with the 8th Oriental Forum on Challenging Infectious Diseases (OFCID) and the Academic Corference of Global Chinese Association of Clinical Microbiology & Infectious Diseases , were held at the Shanghai International Convention Center from July 25-27, 2024. At this academic event, Dr. Xiaodong Gao from Zhongshan Hospital  delivered an in-depth lecture on key topics such as hospital infection assessment, infection control management, hand hygiene practices, and the WHO Global Action Plan on Infection Prevention and Control. In an interview with Infectious Diseases Frontier, Dr.  Gao not only reviewed the founding vision of SIFIC but also provided an in-depth analysis of strategies for infection prevention and control (IPC), the details of hand hygiene management, and how multidisciplinary collaboration can strengthen infection control efforts.

Due to similar transmission routes, approximately 20% of people living with HIV (PLWH) are co-infected with hepatitis B virus (HBV). For decades, rhesus macaques (RMs) have served as a model for HIV research, but they have never been used to study HIV/HBV co-infection. At the AIDS 2024 conference, a research team from Oregon Health & Science University presented an oral report on their successful construction of an RM model co-infected with SHIVDH12 Clone 7 and HBV genotype D. A key advantage of this animal model is the ability to obtain longitudinal biopsies and dynamically monitor changes in immune cell phenotypes and ALT levels, providing better insights into the pathogenesis of co-infection. This article invites Dr. Linghua Li’s team from Guangzhou Eighth People's Hospital, Guangzhou Medical University to delve into this study and interpret the deeper significance behind these research findings.