forever going to the doctor and fighting for insurance forever if there were a cure those burdens would vanish and so would the stigma of a contagious disease intractably linked to unprotected sex and intravenous drug use kids just want to be normal said kline recalling how pediatric hiv patients were once banned from schools and public swimming pools out of fear even though we dont hear the horror stories we did in the early days this disease is stigmatizing and people feel the diagnosis is something they have to shroud and there are the life issues that come up over time when teenagers become sexually active kline added what do they tell their partners what about marriage what about having a family of their own a cure would offer them the opportunity to do all those things that every other person wants to do one day baby cured of hiv but kline said he is wary of the term cure so far it has been used in the case of one mississippi baby who was treated aggressively after being born to an hivpositive mother and testing positive for the infection shortly after birth its an interesting single case not unlike cases i have seen personally and others have seen he said describing how infants sometimes have signs of infection after birth that disappear with time they dont occur commonly but they do occur kline described the case of a baby boy who tested positive for the virus and then negative and then positive and then negative again twentytwo years later the patient still has signs of the virus but remains healthy having never received treatment these are unusual cases and i do think we have something to learn from them kline said but to say this baby was cured because we gave him powerful medications in the first 30 hours of life i think thats a real stretch the case also raises ethical questions since antiretroviral drugs can have toxic side effects according to kline i think thats actually one of the overriding concerns here he said adding that most babies born to hivpositive mothers actually escape the infection i simply do not think this one case has any potential to change the clinical management of infants born to hivpositive mothers even broadbent a guinea pig herself had concerns i dont know how i feel about testing on children she said i think all pregnant women should be tested and treated hopefully it will become mandatory and routine so there will be no more children born with hiv thats very possible