GOZmosis

According to German doctors, an American man with HIV may have been cured of his infection by a bone marrow transplant in Germany. In 2007, the man received a bone marrow transplant to treat his leukemia. The transplant — which treats leukemia by essentially rebooting the body's immune system and creating new white blood cells —also had the benefit of wiping out the HIV infection. Now, three and a half years later, the patient remains HIV-free, which suggests he is cured of the disease, the researchers said. "I'm extremely excited about the result," said Jerome Zack, a researcher at the University of California, Los Angeles, who studies HIV infection and was not involved in the study. "It suggests that at least in this one individual, there's a long-term benefit to this approach." In the transplant, the patient received bone marrow, which contains blood stem cells, from a donor with a rare mutation. The mutation essentially prevents the most common f...