HIV-resistant Hungarians were discovered – here is what they said

The reason is a very unique gene mutation that causes irreversible muscular dystrophy, but as a side effect, it provides immunity to AIDS. There are only a few families in the world that have this gene mutation, and among them, there is a Hungarian mother with her son. Below, you can find what she told Index about this unbelievably important milestone in the fight against AIDS.

Since HIV is one of the most-researched areas, scientists know exactly how they work and which albumin helps them to multiply and cause the disease. Therefore, these are the targets of scientific research; if they were switched off, the virus could not harm anybody, Index reported.

Simply deactivating them, however, can cause much more trouble than HIV, but natural mutations of these cell parts could be a solution for the whole problem. The mutation resulting in resistance against HIV is called

limb-girdle muscular dystrophy type 1F, 

which is extremely rare but hereditary, and apart from two Hungarians (a mother and her child) there is only a Spanish-Italian family in the world where the mutant gene was detected.

The Hungarian mother concerned said to Index that one of her sons, who is 14 years old, inherited this special kind of muscular dystrophy, and the doctors did not know until 2016 what their exact problem was. The disease causes death in the long run since, after a while, it damages the muscles of the respiratory system, causing asphyxia. Nobody knows what the causes are but this kind of disease

gets worse with every new generation,

and eventually, the patients cannot climb stairs.

Since the whole disease was only discovered in the ’90s, decades passed until she and her son learned what their illness was. Endre Pál from the University of Pécs offered it to them in 2010 to take part in an international research program, and thanks to that, their genome was mapped in Canada. This is how the mutation was finally found in 2016. There is no known link yet between the Hungarian and the Spanish-Italian family.