Introduction

A sixth person dubbed the Geneva patient may be free of HIV after receiving a stem cell transplant intended to treat another disease, his cancer. The man who was diagnosed with HIV in 1990 continues to have no detectable virus in his blood 20 months after stopping medication to control the infection. All five received stem cells from donors with a rare mutation in a gene called CCR5 that has been shown to hamper HIV's ability to enter cells. This patient's donor didn't possess this protective mutation and had normal stem cells.