11 ms·

HIV evolving 'into milder form'

101 points by GotAnyMegadeth 12y ago

pistle 12y ago
> "Twenty years ago the time to Aids was 10 years, but in the last 10 years in Botswana that might have increased to 12.5 years, a sort of incremental change, but in the big picture that is a rapid change." 20 years ago, the ARV's and mixes weren't what they were 10 years ago and awareness + access to therapy also changed. Therapy initiation guidelines changed - which would directly impact time to AIDS. Throw that statement away in relation to the meaning of the study results - except if this statement is there, it raises a concern about bias or mistakes in the study due to an insufficiently rigorous handling of the data and contexts/meaning.
guard-of-terra 12y ago
I wonder if infecting a person with AIDS with milder form of HIV will make them better.
- Beltiras 12y ago
  HIV rewrites how the immune system works. Doing it again more mildly will not improve the situation.
  - Dylan16807 12y ago
    Don't just assume that. (Even if you happen to be right in this case.)
- ars 12y ago
  That would imply that HIV viruses compete with each other, and this competition is able to suppress each other. This is typical with bacteria, but I don't think it happens with viruses.
  - couradical 12y ago
    Sure it can - think of smallpox: the first smallpox "vaccine" was actually inoculation with cowpox - a similar, but less virulent virus. The provoked immune response rendered a smallpox infection less lethal, and provided a measure of protection. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smallpox_vaccine http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smallpox_vaccine
    - ars 12y ago
      That's quite different, we are speaking of have two pathogens compete, not about triggering an immune response. If you took someone who is already infected with smallpox and gave them cowpox it would not help. You confused in what order the infections occur.
- SideburnsOfDoom 12y ago
  > wonder if infecting a person with AIDS with milder form of HIV will make them better Basically, no. Based on current experience it seems that it would not improve matters and may make them worse. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1169464/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1169464/ http://www.rense.com/general8/multiple.htm http://www.rense.com/general8/multiple.htm http://i-base.info/qa/2881 http://i-base.info/qa/2881
- streptomycin 12y ago
  You are not the first to wonder that! Back in the early 90s some scientists actually tried it on people with severe AIDS http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~piecze/Lancet.PDF http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~piecze/Lancet.PDF - some seemingly improved, but the trial was too small and preliminary to be conclusive. When they published those results, there was a huge backlash about ethical concerns and the research got shut down. I took a class taught by Dr. Pieczenik about 5 years ago and he still believed this idea would work if it was allowed to proceed.
- cryoshon 12y ago
  No, not make them better, but there is an interesting story here which I heard when I attended a lecture at my job researching HIV. HIV-1 is the "HIV" we all know and fear. While HIV-1 was derived/evolved from SIV (simian immunodeficiency virus), it's actually not as similar to SIV as HIV-2, another strain. HIV-2 is far less dangerous and transmissible in comparison to HIV-1, and doesn't exist in large quantities outside of sub-Saharan Africa. Critically, there is some new research which shows that infection with HIV-2 first provides a substantial amount of protection against later infection by HIV-1. People who were infected with HIV-2 before being infected with HIV-1 had lower viral loads and slowed disease progression in comparison to people who were infected with HIV-1 alone. This lead the researcher giving the talk to state the extremely stunning (yet perhaps true) fact: "HIV-2 is the best vaccine against HIV-1 that we have."
ars 12y ago
That's pretty typical for parasites (which include viruses). Killing your host is never a good idea, the best parasites cause minimal disruption to their host. All animals and humans are infected with countless parasites, but you never notice. For example https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Face_mite https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Face_mite (don't scratch).
- shittyanalogy 12y ago
  Parasites can have multiple host species, some in which they are benign and some in which they are deadly. Malaria has been killing humans for thousands of years. Also for example, HIV.
- GotAnyMegadeth 12y ago
  Sometimes if the parasite moves from host to host as part of it's life cycle, and this can include aiding the death of one host. An example of this is a parasite that causes frogs to grow extra legs so that they are easier to catch for birds. The parasite then transfers to the bird, where it can lay it's eggs. http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2013/02/13/a-flurry-of-frog-legs/ http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2013/02/13/a-flurry-...
billpg 12y ago
What viruses "want" is to reproduce. Killing you is an unfortunate unplanned side effect. If only we could negotiate and agree to allow them to reproduce and not kill us, we'd all get along much better.
- zecg 12y ago
  Epstein-Barr virus is close to that ideal, 90-95% of adults have it. Unfortunately, it's connected with cancers: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epstein%E2%80%93Barr_virus http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epstein%E2%80%93Barr_virus
  - hazz 12y ago
    90-95% of adults had it at some point. Most people develop immunity to it and so it doesn't survive in them. I'd say the most successful virus in humans would be the common cold, given how frequently we seem to get it, although it's more of a massive family of virii.
    - jbogp 12y ago
      No actually once you have it, you have it forever. EBV latently persists in the individual's B cells for the rest of the individual's life [1] [1]: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15546128 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15546128
      - JabavuAdams 12y ago
        jbogp, I'd be interested to chat with you about your experience interviewing with DeepMind (found that searching HN for DeepMind info). My contact info is on my user profile page. Sorry about the thread-jack.
    - henderson101 12y ago
      Virii is a nonsense word. Unless, Virius was your original reference word.
thanatosmin 12y ago
Reading the original paper, they compare Botswana and S Africa and find a correlation between seroprevalence and viral load. There is not good evidence to suggest this is causative however--this may be, for example, that as you get to higher frequencies of cases differently aged people are more likely to be infected and show different viral loads. A direct causal link between these two factors doesn't make a huge amount of sense, because (AFAIK) HIV is thought to sample all viral sequences within each host (so population-level selection should represent individual-level variation).
nsajko 12y ago
http://www.davidbrin.com/givingplague.html http://www.davidbrin.com/givingplague.html A very nice story of Brin based on the notion of a process of infectious agents "watering down" over time.
- chadgeidel 12y ago
  Thank you! I was just going to ask for that story!
ruairinewman 12y ago
Surely this process means that HIV is just as capable of evolving into something even more lethal over time, given the right environment? Given the relatively closed environment of a country like North Korea (for example) where diversity is restricted, its evolutionary path may take a different route than that observed by the University of Oxford research team?
- hnnewguy 12y ago
  Why do people downvote questions?
- jowiar 12y ago
  Can random mutations make HIV more lethal? Sure. The argument here is that lethality makes HIV "less fit" from an evolutionary standpoint, which makes sense, as, given the means of transmission, killing the host isn't a particularly useful thing for the virus to do.
- ars 12y ago
  > Surely this process means that HIV is just as capable of evolving into something even more lethal over time, given the right environment? It's unlikely. HIV doesn't "want" to kill the host because that also kills the HIV, so it's the opposite of what it wants. You would need an environment that favored killing the host over keeping it alive, and considering how HIV is transmitted that is unlikely. (Unlike Ebola where it can happen because Ebola is best transmitted from a corpse.)
kornakiewicz 12y ago
Good guy HIV.
fenomas 12y ago
As is so often the case, William Gibson came pretty close to predicting this: http://everything2.com/title/J.D.+Shapely http://everything2.com/title/J.D.+Shapely
astralship 12y ago
strikes me that human immune systems are working collaboratively in the case of HIV
BrainInAJar 12y ago
"In theory, if we were to let HIV run its course then we would see a human population emerge that was more resistant to the virus than we collectively are today - HIV infection would eventually become almost harmless." Because millions (or billions) of people would die, leaving only those with resistance.

101 points by GotAnyMegadeth 12y ago

> "Twenty years ago the time to Aids was 10 years, but in the last 10 years in Botswana that might have increased to 12.5 years, a sort of incremental change, but in the big picture that is a rapid change." 20 years ago, the ARV's and mixes weren't what they were 10 years ago and awareness + access to therapy also changed. Therapy initiation guidelines changed - which would directly impact time to AIDS. Throw that statement away in relation to the meaning of the study results - except if this statement is there, it raises a concern about bias or mistakes in the study due to an insufficiently rigorous handling of the data and contexts/meaning.

guard-of-terra 12y ago

I wonder if infecting a person with AIDS with milder form of HIV will make them better.

Beltiras 12y ago
HIV rewrites how the immune system works. Doing it again more mildly will not improve the situation.
- Dylan16807 12y ago
  Don't just assume that. (Even if you happen to be right in this case.)
ars 12y ago
That would imply that HIV viruses compete with each other, and this competition is able to suppress each other. This is typical with bacteria, but I don't think it happens with viruses.
- couradical 12y ago
  Sure it can - think of smallpox: the first smallpox "vaccine" was actually inoculation with cowpox - a similar, but less virulent virus. The provoked immune response rendered a smallpox infection less lethal, and provided a measure of protection. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smallpox_vaccine http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smallpox_vaccine
  - ars 12y ago
    That's quite different, we are speaking of have two pathogens compete, not about triggering an immune response. If you took someone who is already infected with smallpox and gave them cowpox it would not help. You confused in what order the infections occur.
SideburnsOfDoom 12y ago
> wonder if infecting a person with AIDS with milder form of HIV will make them better Basically, no. Based on current experience it seems that it would not improve matters and may make them worse. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1169464/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1169464/ http://www.rense.com/general8/multiple.htm http://www.rense.com/general8/multiple.htm http://i-base.info/qa/2881 http://i-base.info/qa/2881
streptomycin 12y ago
You are not the first to wonder that! Back in the early 90s some scientists actually tried it on people with severe AIDS http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~piecze/Lancet.PDF http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~piecze/Lancet.PDF - some seemingly improved, but the trial was too small and preliminary to be conclusive. When they published those results, there was a huge backlash about ethical concerns and the research got shut down. I took a class taught by Dr. Pieczenik about 5 years ago and he still believed this idea would work if it was allowed to proceed.
cryoshon 12y ago
No, not make them better, but there is an interesting story here which I heard when I attended a lecture at my job researching HIV. HIV-1 is the "HIV" we all know and fear. While HIV-1 was derived/evolved from SIV (simian immunodeficiency virus), it's actually not as similar to SIV as HIV-2, another strain. HIV-2 is far less dangerous and transmissible in comparison to HIV-1, and doesn't exist in large quantities outside of sub-Saharan Africa. Critically, there is some new research which shows that infection with HIV-2 first provides a substantial amount of protection against later infection by HIV-1. People who were infected with HIV-2 before being infected with HIV-1 had lower viral loads and slowed disease progression in comparison to people who were infected with HIV-1 alone. This lead the researcher giving the talk to state the extremely stunning (yet perhaps true) fact: "HIV-2 is the best vaccine against HIV-1 that we have."

ars 12y ago

That's pretty typical for parasites (which include viruses). Killing your host is never a good idea, the best parasites cause minimal disruption to their host. All animals and humans are infected with countless parasites, but you never notice. For example https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Face_mite https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Face_mite (don't scratch).

shittyanalogy 12y ago
Parasites can have multiple host species, some in which they are benign and some in which they are deadly. Malaria has been killing humans for thousands of years. Also for example, HIV.
GotAnyMegadeth 12y ago
Sometimes if the parasite moves from host to host as part of it's life cycle, and this can include aiding the death of one host. An example of this is a parasite that causes frogs to grow extra legs so that they are easier to catch for birds. The parasite then transfers to the bird, where it can lay it's eggs. http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2013/02/13/a-flurry-of-frog-legs/ http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2013/02/13/a-flurry-...

billpg 12y ago

What viruses "want" is to reproduce. Killing you is an unfortunate unplanned side effect. If only we could negotiate and agree to allow them to reproduce and not kill us, we'd all get along much better.

zecg 12y ago
Epstein-Barr virus is close to that ideal, 90-95% of adults have it. Unfortunately, it's connected with cancers: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epstein%E2%80%93Barr_virus http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epstein%E2%80%93Barr_virus
- hazz 12y ago
  90-95% of adults had it at some point. Most people develop immunity to it and so it doesn't survive in them. I'd say the most successful virus in humans would be the common cold, given how frequently we seem to get it, although it's more of a massive family of virii.
  - jbogp 12y ago
    No actually once you have it, you have it forever. EBV latently persists in the individual's B cells for the rest of the individual's life [1] [1]: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15546128 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15546128
    - JabavuAdams 12y ago
      jbogp, I'd be interested to chat with you about your experience interviewing with DeepMind (found that searching HN for DeepMind info). My contact info is on my user profile page. Sorry about the thread-jack.
  - henderson101 12y ago
    Virii is a nonsense word. Unless, Virius was your original reference word.

thanatosmin 12y ago

Reading the original paper, they compare Botswana and S Africa and find a correlation between seroprevalence and viral load. There is not good evidence to suggest this is causative however--this may be, for example, that as you get to higher frequencies of cases differently aged people are more likely to be infected and show different viral loads. A direct causal link between these two factors doesn't make a huge amount of sense, because (AFAIK) HIV is thought to sample all viral sequences within each host (so population-level selection should represent individual-level variation).

nsajko 12y ago

http://www.davidbrin.com/givingplague.html http://www.davidbrin.com/givingplague.html A very nice story of Brin based on the notion of a process of infectious agents "watering down" over time.

chadgeidel 12y ago
Thank you! I was just going to ask for that story!

ruairinewman 12y ago

Surely this process means that HIV is just as capable of evolving into something even more lethal over time, given the right environment? Given the relatively closed environment of a country like North Korea (for example) where diversity is restricted, its evolutionary path may take a different route than that observed by the University of Oxford research team?

hnnewguy 12y ago
Why do people downvote questions?
jowiar 12y ago
Can random mutations make HIV more lethal? Sure. The argument here is that lethality makes HIV "less fit" from an evolutionary standpoint, which makes sense, as, given the means of transmission, killing the host isn't a particularly useful thing for the virus to do.
ars 12y ago
> Surely this process means that HIV is just as capable of evolving into something even more lethal over time, given the right environment? It's unlikely. HIV doesn't "want" to kill the host because that also kills the HIV, so it's the opposite of what it wants. You would need an environment that favored killing the host over keeping it alive, and considering how HIV is transmitted that is unlikely. (Unlike Ebola where it can happen because Ebola is best transmitted from a corpse.)

kornakiewicz 12y ago

Good guy HIV.

fenomas 12y ago

As is so often the case, William Gibson came pretty close to predicting this: http://everything2.com/title/J.D.+Shapely http://everything2.com/title/J.D.+Shapely

astralship 12y ago

strikes me that human immune systems are working collaboratively in the case of HIV

BrainInAJar 12y ago

"In theory, if we were to let HIV run its course then we would see a human population emerge that was more resistant to the virus than we collectively are today - HIV infection would eventually become almost harmless." Because millions (or billions) of people would die, leaving only those with resistance.