The cancer girl cured by the HIV virus

The cancer girl cured by the HIV virus: Seven-year-old makes extraordinary recovery after U.S. doctors re-wire her immune system to destroy leukaemia cells

In April this year, Emily Whitehead's family had almost given up hope.

The brave six-year-old had been fighting leukaemia for two years. But in February she had relapsed for a second time during intensive chemotherapy treatment.

Doctors had exhausted all the traditional treatments, so Emily's desperate parents, Kari and Tom, started looking at more radical options.

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So they turned to the Cancer Center at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, which is involved in testing a pioneering new therapy.

Doctors suggested they sign Emily up to a clinical trial that would use a disabled form of HIV to carry cancer-fighting genes into her T-cells (disease fighting cells). The hope was that this would reprogram her immune system to recognise the cancer cells and start killing them.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2246312/Girl-7-beats-leukaemia-revolutionary-treatment-using-HIV-virus-wire-immune-system.html#ixzz2EkWdPDgM
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