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CrateDane t1_iw3i3q7 wrote

Reply to comment by wolfgang784 in How do medical researchers obtain lab animals with diseases like specific forms of cancer which arise spontaneously? Do they raise thousands of apes and hope some eventually develop the disease? by userbrn1

It was a knockout of the gene for CCR5, a coreceptor for (some types of) HIV. That gives resistance to infection. The coreceptor does not seem to be that important, as some people are in fact born without a functional copy of the gene and appear to be normal (aside from resistance to HIV infection).

We just don't really know enough yet to say whether you're better off with or without CCR5, even putting all the ethical issues aside.

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triffid_boy t1_iw3ram7 wrote

CCR5 is useful in cold/flu response and that's a hell of a lot more common than HIV. even in people with close contact with someone with HIV. Hell these days colds and flus are more of a faff than HIV is for those people infected but taking PReP!!

It was such a ludicrously ethically dumb experiment.

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