What You Haven't Heard About the HIV Baby's 'Cure'

A Mississippi baby's so-called HIV "cure" looks promising so far, according to a new study, but the study doesn't mention that doctors began aggressive and potentially toxic treatment for the virus days before they could confirm she had it. 

The doctors behind a Mississippi baby's so-called HIV "cure" announced eight months ago with great fanfare have published a study about the case, but they're no longer calling it a "functional cure" as they did in March. 

Instead, they've opted for the more conservative term "remission," presumably because the virus could still return to cause an infection.

But in three years, it hasn't, according to the study. 

"I'm glad they're not still calling it a functional cure," said Dr. Mark Kline, a pediatric HIV and AIDS specialist at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, who said many of his patients have approached him since last March with the false hope that they, too, could stop taking their HIV medication. 

"On the basis of one case, it's hard to say whether there are broader treatment implications. For right now, I'd say probably not." 

Dr. Hannah Gay, a University of Mississippi Medical Center pediatrician, treated the baby girl with aggressive doses of potentially toxic antiretroviral drugs 30 hours after her birth. 

Gay ran virologic tests shortly before she started the baby on HIV treatment, but she did not wait the several days it would take for the test results to confirm whether the baby was actually infected with the virus, ABCNews.com reported last March. 

Since there was a 75 percent to 80 percent chance that the baby would not have contracted HIV from her mother, Gay's treatment has often been called "gutsy." 

Gay and two of her fellow researchers were named one of Time magazine's most influential people of 2013. 

"We're thrilled that the child remains off medication and has no detectable virus replicating," Gay said in a statement Oct. 23. 

"We've continued to follow the child, obviously, and she continues to do very well. There is no sign of the return of HIV, and we will continue to follow her for the long term." 

Gay was not available to comment on why she and her colleagues are no longer using the word "cure," said a university spokeswoman.