amfAR Holds HIV Cure Summit on World AIDS Day 2016    

On World AIDS Day, Thursday, December 1 at the Robertson Auditorium in San Francisco, amfAR will hold a community update on progress toward an HIV cure, featuring leading researchers from the amfAR Institute for HIV Cure Research.

"The global AIDS epidemic is far from over and it will not be ended without a vaccine and a cure. The only way to achieve either of those is with continued investments in both basic and clinical research. Substantial progress has been made in HIV cure research in particular, and there is some confidence in the scientific community that a cure can be achieved," amfAR CEO Kevin Robert Frost told EDGE.

Frost joins an esteemed panel of speakers, including Steven Deeks, M.D., Professor of Medicine, UCSF; Peter Hunt, M.D., Associate Professor of Medicine, Division of Experimental Medicine, UCSF; Satish Pillai, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Laboratory Medicine, UCSF, Associate Investigator, Blood Systems Research Institute; Matt Sharp, HIV Treatment Advocate Paul Volberding, M.D., Professor of Medicine, UCSF, Director, UCSF AIDS Research Institute, Co-Director, UCSF-Gladstone Center for AIDS Research; and Warner C. Greene, M.D., Ph.D., Director and Nick and Susan Hellman Distinguished Professor of Translational Medicine, Gladstone Institute of Virology and Immunology, Professor of Medicine, Microbiology and Immunology, UCSF, Co-Director, UCSF-Gladstone Center for AIDS Research.

The 2016 HIV Cure Summit is a community research briefing sponsored by amfAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research and intended for the general public. The World AIDS Day event will bring together some of the world's leading HIV/AIDS scientists and experts from the amfAR Institute for HIV Cure Research to provide updates on recent progress toward a cure for HIV.

Worldwide it is estimated that nearly 37 million people are infected with HIV. Current antiretroviral therapy (ART) can help people live longer and healthier lives, but it cannot eliminate the virus.
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Launched on the eve of World AIDS Day in 2015, amfAR established the amfAR Institute for HIV Cure Research at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). The Institute is the cornerstone of amfAR's $100 million cure research investment strategy to foster innovation among collaborative research teams, with the goal of developing the scientific basis for a cure by 2020.
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The amfAR Institute for HIV Cure Research aims to advance groundbreaking biomedical and clinical research toward the development of a cure for HIV/AIDS by bringing together leading cure researchers in the Bay Area and Northwest region and enabling teams of researchers to work collaboratively, across institutions and across disciplines, to address the key challenges that must be overcome to affect a cure.

Frost said that this is more important than ever, noting that, "the NIH is a critically important leader in this effort, and cuts in funding for AIDS research at NIH will stall progress toward a cure, leading to millions of avoidable deaths and perpetuating the global epidemic for decades to come."

The HIV Cure Summit will be held from 1-4 p.m. on Thursday, December 1, at Robertson Auditorium, UCSF Mission Bay Campus, 1675 Owens Street, San Francisco, CA.