“kick and kill” strategy:
Now, a drug already used to treat cancer has been found to make HIV reactivate. To be turned into a cure, it would have to be combined with a second kind of medicine that kills the immune cells churning out viruses. No such medicine is yet proven to work, although some experimental versions are in development.
The idea that dormant viruses could be reactivated before being destroyed is sometimes known as a “kick and kill” strategy. In the latest work, Sharon Lewin at the University of Melbourne, Australia, and her colleagues studied people with HIV who also had cancer and were being treated with a relatively new medicine called pembrolizumab. [“Cancer drug could one day help cure HIV by waking up dormant viruses,” Clare Wilson, NewScientist (5 February 2022)]
Apparently, a dormant virus, such as HIV when it’s in hiding in immune cells, is not vulnerable to drug therapies. So, wake up the dino and kill it, eh?
Sounds a bit scary.
