More Scalding of Infected Blood OKd

AIDS researchers have received government permission to expand an unorthodox experiment: scalding patients’ blood in an attempt to fight the deadly virus.

The Food and Drug Administration will let IDT Inc. add 60 AIDS patients to its trial, in which a patient’s blood is drained, heated to 114 degrees and circulated back in, the company announced Thursday.

The FDA cautioned that nobody has proved that the treatment helps. The early trials merely showed that IDT could heat patients’ blood, bringing their body temperature to almost 108 degrees, without causing brain damage or other harm, said the FDA’s Dr. Susan Alpert.

Now the FDA will carefully check the 60 new patients for signs that the heat fought the virus.

The theory is that heat will kill some of the HIV roaming through patients’ blood, temporarily clearing enough of the virus that patients’ exhausted immune systems have a chance to fight back. Many scientists doubt it, and some early attempts in other countries ended with the patients dying.

After all six patients survived the IDT trial, the FDA let IDT heat 20 more people in Lafayette, Ind. None of those whose temperatures reached 108 degrees has suffered any AIDS-related infections since.