The China-US HIV Functional Cure Symposium held September 8-9, 2015 in Guangzhou, China marked the first academic exchange on the scientific research of HIV cure between the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and south China. The HIV cure symposium was co-organized by the Guangzhou Eighth People’s Hospital and University of North Carolina Project-China. Three UNC professors, Dr. Victor Garcia, Dr. Kevin Robertson, and Dr. Ronald Swanstrom, joined with their Chinese counterparts, Dr. Weiping Cai from the Guangzhou Eighth People’s Hospital, Dr. Lin Chen from the Guangzhou Institute of Biomedicine and Health (GIBH), Chinese Academy of Science, and Dr. Hui Zhang from Sat Yat-sen University, to present on various aspects of HIV cure and cure research. The HIV Cure symposium was chaired by Dr. Xiaoping Tang, the director of the Institute for Infectious Diseases at the Guangzhou Eighth People’s Hospital as well as the chief of Guangzhou Municipal Health Bureau.
In addition to local Guangzhou scientists and clinical physicians, the HIV cure symposium was well attended by researchers of HIV cure from all over China, including Beijing and Xi’an. Dr. Weiping Cai, one of organizers of the symposium, a presenter, and the chair of the Infectious Diseases Department at the Guangzhou Eighth People’s Hospital, said in his closing statement that this symposium “has been the highest level conference on HIV cure ever held in China in recent years”. Besides the experienced researchers, the symposium also drew the attention of young scholars and students to the field of HIV cure. The symposium provided a good training opportunity for younger generation researchers in China and a lot of questions were raised and heatedly discussed.
From the social science perspective, what the HIV cure symposium indicates are the differences and challenges to conduct HIV cure research in resource limited settings. A symposium like this is a good start to increase engagement of stakeholders around the world into HIV cure research. In a world towards an HIV cure, more global collaboration is necessary to achieve an affordable cure.
