A recent article from Interesting Engineering discussed Zion Medical, a biotech company out of Israel that focuses on HIV and cancer treatments. Zion just released results of its first clinical trial of Gammora, a new HIV drug that offers hope for a cure to the retrovirus. The treatment consists of a synthetic peptide that integrats with HIV-infected cells and triggers apoptosis, or the cell’s self-destruction.
In a clinical trial, Gammora killed 99% of the HIV virus within just a month of treatment. This method of treatment is preferred over the current options, which just suppress the spread of the virus without offering a cure for the infection. Gammora is safe and “well-tolerable” with no reported side effects. There’s still a lot of work to do before the drug is FDA-approved and available on the market, but these results show promise that we may one day have a cure for HIV.
