Oslo Patient Shows No Trace of HIV After Bone Marrow Transplant, Defying Medical Statistics

A 63-year-old man known as the “Oslo patient” is likely cured of HIV after receiving a stem cell transplant from his brother, who carried a rare genetic mutation that confers resistance to the virus, according to findings published in the journal Nature Microbiology on April 13, 2026.

The patient was diagnosed with HIV in 2006 at age 44. About 15 years later, in 2020, he underwent a bone marrow transplant to treat an underlying blood disorder. The transplant used stem cells from his brother, who was found to carry two copies of the CCR5 delta 32 mutation, a genetic variant that prevents HIV from entering immune cells by disabling the CCR5 co-receptor the virus uses to infect cells.

Following the procedure, the patient has maintained undetectable levels of HIV without antiretroviral treatment for more than three years. Researchers at Oslo University Hospital have conducted extensive testing on his blood, bone marrow, and intestines, finding no trace of active HIV virus. The case has been monitored for over a year after initial announcements, with repeated tests confirming the absence of viral rebound.

The Oslo patient is now considered the seventh man in the world likely cured of HIV through stem cell transplantation. Prior cases, such as the Berlin patient (Timothy Ray Brown), also involved transplants from donors with the CCR5 delta 32 mutation, but in those instances, the donors were unrelated to the patients. In the Oslo case, the donor was a sibling, which increases the likelihood of a genetic match; siblings have a 25% probability of being a compatible transplant match, and the frequency of individuals carrying two copies of the CCR5Δ32 mutation in northern European populations is approximately 1%.

More than 30 researchers at Oslo University Hospital have been involved in studying the patient’s case. The research was peer-reviewed and published in Nature Microbiology, with Professor Marius Trøseid of Oslo University Hospital stating that the sustained remission strengthens confidence in the authenticity of the cure. He noted that the findings contribute to a growing body of evidence suggesting that HIV cure through stem cell transplantation may be replicable under specific conditions.

As of April 2026, ten people worldwide have achieved long-term HIV remission after undergoing stem cell transplants to treat hematological cancers, with the Oslo patient representing the most recent published case. Scientists involved in the research, including Javier Martínez-Picado of IrsiCaixa, emphasize that these cases are not coincidental but reflect over a decade of international collaboration through the IciStem consortium, which aims to understand the mechanisms of HIV cure and develop broader applications.

While stem cell transplantation remains a high-risk procedure primarily reserved for treating life-threatening cancers, the Oslo patient case provides valuable insight into how HIV can be eradicated under controlled conditions. Researchers caution that this approach is not scalable for the general population living with HIV due to the dangers associated with transplants, but it continues to inform the development of alternative strategies, such as gene therapy, aimed at replicating the protective effect of the CCR5 delta 32 mutation.