If you hear the phrase “bubble boy”, you may immediately think of the Seinfeld episode focusing on the topic. And when you hear about HIV, you probably view it as the first stage of what ultimately is a terminal disease (certainly not a cure). A study just published in the New England Journal of Medicine explains how researchers apparently cured the underlying disease causing the “bubble boy” syndrome by introducing a special form of HIV.
That’s right, fighting fire with fire (in a medical sense). As with most brand new studies like this, much more research is needed; this particular study only included eight participants. Prior to this study, people with X-linked severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID-X1) were typically confined to artificial plastic bubbles their entire lives to protect their bodies (which basically lacked anything resembling a proper immune system) from the outside world.
The actual content of this study is rather dense and hard to digest for anybody without a doctorate. The quick summary is that doctors at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis and UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital in San Francisco injected a gene to fix the immune system by way of a uniquely modified HIV virus.
Over the years before this study, a variety of treatments were attempted but generally failed. Sadly, the condition became commonly associated with young children simply because people suffering from it did not live long enough to reach adulthood. But this research brings a great deal of new hope to any parents who are caring for an afflicted child and to people in general. Doctors and researchers will continue to monitor the children from this study to keep an eye on their newly functional immune systems.