HIV is seen as one of the most fatal diseases worldwide & continues to be a major global public health challenge.

Last year, an estimated 36.7 million people were living with HIV (including 1.8 million children) -with a global HIV incidence of 0.8 % among adults. Around 30 % of these same people don’t know that they have the virus.

A group of scientists have been looking for ways to get rid of the 'reservoirs' where the virus hides, & researchers may have found a solution.

Their method involves sending an agent to 'wake up' the dormant virus, which causes it to start replicating so that either the immune system or the virus itself would kill the cell housing HIV.

Scientists term the technique "kick & kill."

According to a report last year, India had a total of 1.96 new HIV cases. This number is in addition to the existing 28.81 lakh people who were already living with HIV as of 2015.

According to the findings, destroying the reservoir cells could purge some or all HIV virus from people who are infected.

And although the scientists' method hasn’t been tested in humans yet, a synthetic molecule they developed has been effective at kicking & killing HIV in lab animals,.

David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, & the study's lead author, said, "The latent HIV reservoir is very stable & can reactivate virus replication if a patient stops taking antiretroviral drugs for any reason. Our study suggests that there may be means of activating latent virus in the body while the patient is on antiretroviral drugs to prevent the virus from spreading, & that this may eliminate at least some of the latent reservoir."

With additional development, the approach could lower the viral reservoir enough for people with HIV to be able to put an end to their anti-viral therapy, Marsden said.

SUW133 is based on bryostatin 1, a natural compound pulled out from a marine animal called Bugula neritina.

The research determined that the new compound is less toxic than the naturally occurring version.

"The findings are major because several previous attempts to activate latent virus have had only limited success. Most studies showed weak activation of the virus, or severe toxicity, with little effect on the reservoir," noted senior author Jerome Zack, professor & chair of the UCLA department of microbiology.

Marsden concluded results in mice will not essentially translate to humans.

The study was made available in journal PLOS Pathogens.