HIV Cure 2013? Danish Scientists Say It Could Happen 'Within Months'

Researchers in Denmark have begun clinical trials on a new treatment intended to cure HIV.

The cure is designed to remove HIV from human DNA and be permanently destroyed by the immune system.

The treatment has already been proven effective in laboratory testing and scientists will now move on to human subjects to replicate the results.

The cure would entail the HIV virus being released from "reservoirs" in the body, coaxing the virus to the surface of cells. Once surfaced, the body's natural defenses will destroy the virus with the help of a sort of vaccine.

The lab studies were in fact so successful that the Danish Research Council granted the team 12 million Danish kroner, about $2.1 million USD, to continue the study.

This comes not long after the US called off research seeking a possible HIV vaccine, which provided mixed results and ultimately failed to reveal anything conclusive.

The vaccine intended to introduce small amounts of HIV into the body without predisposing the recipient to the condition, allowing the body to recognize and fight any HIV cells transmitted into the body.

Ole Søgaard, a senior researcher at the Aarhus University Hospital, said that he is very confident the reservoir strategy can work, but also emphasized that it is not a preventative measure.

He encouraged a continued effort to educate people about safe sex and sharing needles in order to prevent the spread of HIV, which causes AIDS.

His main concern with the cure is that it needs to be able to be manipulated in order to accommodate different bodies.

"The challenge will be getting the patients' immune system to recognise the virus and destroy it. This depends on the strength and sensitivity of individual immune systems," he told the Telegraph.

As it stands, the only way to manage HIV is through medication that suppresses the virus. This can lead to mild or even the "elimination" of symptoms, but once the medicine is discontinued, the HIV will manifest itself again within two weeks.

Despite progress, the cure would not be available immediately for mass consumption. The development of a large-scale, widely-distributed cure could take five years.