This
article (‘HIV Inactivates Attacking T-Cells’) at MedPage Today seems to reveal what exactly happened to the 6 British volunteers who tested new medication and ended up in intensive care (March of this year):
The fear (ed: of triggering serious immunological problems) was given tangible form in March, when six healthy volunteers testing an experimental T-cell stimulator in England suffered extreme inflammatory reactions and subsequently landed in intensive care.
There’s no mention of any experimental T-Cell stimulator in the original BBC report nor does the earlier mentioned article mention anything about the 6 patients.
Update: T-Cells at Wikipedia
Update 2: Looking for more background info on the 6 volunteers, more (recent) article at News Medical.Net about how the 6 men are coping: While all of seem have recovered, one of them has shown early signs of lymphatic cancer. The article details the complications after the (almost) fatal experiment and the fight to keep the 6 alive.
I’m sorry about the volunteers, but the discovery is probably good news anyway. It must be hard finding ways to get this sort of work done in a way that doesn’t harm someone or some being.
It must be hard finding ways to get this sort of work done in a way that doesn’t harm someone or some being.
I find it amazing that there were actually volunteers, that is, unless nobody was really aware of risks, or nobody really expected it to go that bad.