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Case Number 1:

Three patients that were treated for AIDS in 1988 were followed up for 8 years till 1997. This was a family of a husband and 2 wives. They reported to my clinic in May 1988 in Kampala, Uganda.

The husband was 42 years and the 1st wife 39 and 2nd wife 28 years of age. The husband complained of abdominal pain, recurrent fevers, skin rash and candidiasis in the oral cavity. The symptoms and signs had defied conventional treatments in hospitals in Kampala.

The physical examination confirmed that he had full-blown AIDS. His Haemoglobin was 10.4gm, white blood count 3,500/cmm N38%, L 59%, OES 3%. ELISA was positive confirmed by western blots. This patient was started on Mariandina.  The wife had diabetes mellitus and was on insulin daily. The diabetes did not give rise to complications. Her haemogram was unremarkable.

The second wife though HIV seropositive was free from symptoms or signs. When the husband brought her to my clinic for HIV testing, the purpose was not revealed to her for fear of causing unnecessary panic. Treatment was started on all three family members.

The husband took six months before all his symptoms and signs disappeared. The 1st wife continued using insulin for 4 months from the start on Mariandina treatment. The blood sugar normalised in the 5th month.

Since 1988, the family has been tested three times for HIV and each time the husband and the two wives were HIV positive. The second wife was tested in 1990 and was HIV negative. In 1991 the first wife also turned negative after 4 years of treatment. The husband and his two wives continued treatment till 1992 when the husband also turned negative.

Since the family was started on treatment, in 1988, two children were born in the family by the second wife and both are enjoying normal health free from HIV infection. From 1993, the family discontinued treatment up to now, 1997, and still remained symptom free. No PCR tests for determining viral load were ever done.

Case history number 2:

In 1992, a young lady approached me with a child. She reported to me having symptoms related to AIDS together with a child of three years. The lady who was aged 24 was tested by ELISA and found to be sero reactive. The boy was also tested and found to be HIV positive. The mother who was in relatively good health complained of moderate loss of weight and lack of appetite, a skin rash and recurrent fever. Blood slide was sometimes positive for malaria according to her story from other doctors who had treated her for the past two years.
She was found to have a moderate candidiasis in the oral cavity. She had no signs of any infection on the chest. She only had a mild skin rash consistent with the AIDS. The total blood count showed a haemoglobin of 13gm and the white blood count was just over 3,500/cmm. At that time we did not have facilities for CD4 count and we had no idea of the level at which her immune system was . She was put on Mariandina treatment for a period of six months and the results were very encouraging. The fever disappeared and the skin eruption cleared. The fever that used to bother her stopped. She continued on Mariandina treatment for the next 12 months with not recurrence of any symptoms of AIDS.

The child who was aged 3 was found to be slightly underweight. He had slight tracheal bronchitis with a moderate cough and the Temperature was 37.5 *C and the tongue was coated but there was no evidence of candidiasis. His Elisa test was positive for HIV. The boy was put on antimalarial treatment because there was scanty malarial parasite in the blood. This however, did not clear the temperature. Ampicilin was started for the tracheal bronchitis and the fever subsided after three days.

He was also put on Mariandina treatment, which was in syrup form because of his age. Within three months the boy had started to gain weight by 2Kgs and continued in good health for the next 12 months.  Both mother and child remained in good health from the end of the year treatment in 1992 up to 1995 when they stopped having treatment. I could not trace their whereabouts until 1997 when the mother reported back to my clinic with the story that she had gone to the United Kingdom for a visit that lasted 18 months.
During her stay in the UK, she took her son to a National Health Service general practitioner for an HIV test. To her amazement, the child was HIV negative. He was 7 years old.
Unfortunately, she did not gather enough courage to go for the same test herself for fear of being disappointed should it not be the same as her son.

Case number 3:

This is a lady aged 36 who lost her husband because of HIV/AIDS in 1991. In 1992, she reported to my clinic with a history of multiple swellings in the axilla and in the neck and abdomen. She had a cough that other clinics had diagnosed as due to tuberculosis. She had lost a lot of weight from 64Kgs to42 KGs. She had acquired a moderate candidiasis in the mouth with loss of appetite that normally accompanies oral candidiasis. Physical examination confirmed that she had severe tuberculosis. She had very large lymph nodes in the axilla both right and left. She had multiple lympho adenopathy in the neck and groin, which at the time gave me the impression of a malignant (lymphoma). A biopsy later on disproved this suspicion. The patient had a white blood count of 2,800 cell/mm3. The CD4 count later on was found to be 150/cmm. CD8 was not done at the time.

She was put on Mariandina treatment combined with anti-tuberculosis treatment (Rifampicin, Isoniazid and Ethambital).
She was also given miconazol for the candidiasis. She made rapid improvement. The tuberculosis infection subsided very rapidly in a period of 4 weeks, the cough had subsided and there was significant radiological improvement. After a period of 12 weeks, the lympho adenopathy had very significantly been reduced to just palpable nodes. The rapid reduction of the size of lymph nodes was of great interest because they had not been expected to resolve so fast with the treatment she was receiving at the time. Within 6 months the tuberculosis and the lymph nodes had completely cleared and so was the candidiasis. The symptoms that she had first reported with were all in remission. The patient continued on treatment for the next 3 years without any problem. The CD4 count was done in 1996 December was at 650cells/mm3 and CD8  was 460cells/mm3.

Discussion: The two families quoted are just brought out as examples of more than ten families where the treatment that they received for a period exceeding two years could have been responsible for complete elimination of the virus from their body.
We know that from immunology, it is possible to slow down the replication of HIV in the body by using antioxidants.

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