AIDS is a truly terrible disease; from just 8 million cases in 1990, it has <a href="http://www.avert.org/worldwide-hiv-aids-statistics.htm" target="_blank">ballooned to a whopping 34 million in 2011</a>. 70 percent of all AIDs sufferers come from sub-Saharan Africa. 30 million people have lost their lives to the deadly epidemic since its inception.
It is heartening to hear of ANY progress made fighting back the disease, and scientists from the <a href="http://www.cell.com/cell-reports/abstract/S2211-1247(15)00882-7" target="_blank">Gladstone Institute may have done just that; they have published their research in the Cell Reports journal</a>, with some groundbreaking discoveries on the virus.
They believe that the virus does NOT normally spread throughout the body via direct transmission while floating around the circulatory system, but via cell-to-cell transmission which is 100-1000 times more efficient.
"Although free-floating viruses establish the initial infection, it is the subsequent cell-to-cell spread of HIV that causes massive CD4 T cell death," says co-first author Nicole Galloway, PhD, a post-doctoral fellow at the Gladstone Institute of Virology and Immunology. "Cell-to-cell transmission of HIV is absolutely required for activation of the pathogenic HIV cell-death pathway."
<a href="https://www.google.com.sg/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=9&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CEcQFjAIahUKEwjR36-wgpLIAhUNCY4KHQXiDBU&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.webmd.com%2Fhiv-aids%2Fcd4-count-what-does-it-mean&usg=AFQjCNER91dx2RrzF0-1JE6fh1xxN8eeiA&sig2=Hkf9K5NBQViYZt79qH373w" target="_blank"><em><strong>CD4 cells</strong> </em>or T-helper cells </a>are a type of white blood cell that fights infection and their count indicates the stage of HIV or AIDS in a patient.
"This study fundamentally changes our mindset about how HIV causes massive cell death, and puts the spotlight squarely on the infected cells in lymphoid tissues rather than the free virus," said Dr. Warner C. Greene, director of the Gladstone Institute of Virology and Immunology. "By preventing cell-to-cell transmission, we may able to block the death pathway and stop the progression from HIV infection to AIDS."
Researchers had previously established that <a href="http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v505/n7484/full/nature12940.html" target="_blank">95% of all cell deaths from HIV infections</a> were due to so-called failed infections, where cells simply committed suicide after being infected. This released virus DNA, which activated an enzyme called caspase-1 which caused nearby cells to also commit suicide in a sort of a suicide-pact/ sneeze of death- AKA pyroptosis.
After running a gamut of tests to determine if there was a solution to this chain-reaction of death, they found that preventing cells from being in contact with one another actually prevented the death of more CD4 T cells; it was only during cell-to-cell transmission was caspase-1 activated within the target cells, meaning that free-floating virus transmissions did NOT cause
So basically, cells that touch each other spread HIV easily. Also, some cells that fail to get infected may start a chain-reaction of explosive destruction. Finally, if cells get infected by a free-floating HIV virus, they do not explode- in a sense becoming "hosts" for the disease until they come into contact with other cells; this often causes those cells to become flushed with excitement and blow up.
Hopefully scientists find a way to prevent infected cells from touching healthy ones, doing so could well be the ticket to curing this virus once and for all.
Disclaimer: I am not a Neuro-Scientologist.
hiveblocks