I recall hearing in a documentary that only the un-mutated form of HIV is any good at slipping though the gap in human defenses it uses. So as a consequence, once it gets to mutating, those changed viruses only work inside the current victim. Sorry my memory is not more precise.
Consider, it already mutates a lot, and hasn't turned itself into something more deadly.
I'm probably overly paranoid and certainly under-educated (possibly even to the point of the level of believing in "magic"), but accelerating the mutation rate of something like this just scares me. As I said though, that's an emotionally based feeling and not logical. I'd be VERY happy to have someone scientifically show me I'm full of #$!#.
From my understanding, HIV is already near the max mutation rate that is sustainable, this is what makes it so hard to kill. But it's on the edge of the cliff, if it mutates any faster then too many of the mutated cells aren't viable and not enough live on to the next generation to maintain the population.
You have to understand that most mutations are harmful, beneficial mutation are extremely rare so there is a maximum rate of mutation before mutation itself becomes deadly to the virus. Pushing it over this limit by hijacking its replication process and damaging the DNA is brilliant.
Consider how long the human race would survive if our mutation rate was 80%, things like mental retardation, autism, physical deformity, infant death, etc. would sky rocket, it wouldn't be long before most people couldn't take care of themselves.
HIV's mutation rate occurs after entry. This is due to the fact that HIV seems utterly incapable of fighting the human body without making itself weak in the process. HIV beats the human immune system by changing itself quicker than the human body can adapt.
It's like one day you're fighting the Nazi's, the next day its the USSR, then it's Mussolini's Italy, then it's Saddam and then some Aztec warriors with machine guns. Each day you're expecting to wake up and see more Nazi's, you're not expecting the Iraqi army. Each of these armies is on the retreat, it's just that they win by attrition because every mutation they have they get to swarm your immune system.
It is true that the virus can spread during this time, it's just far less likely. The drug they're proposing is that they make the HIV virus switch its uniform (surface markers in the biological sense) faster, say every 6 hours. Well the problem with this is that you're potentially going to kill the cells through ware, or you're going to end up with an Aztec-Nazi-Russian (or a HIV virus with multiple surface markers) so you then know to attack all of them.
You're somewhat right, with this kind of drug it's likely only going to benefit us that we're cautious to make sure it doesn't create a new virus. Hopefully the virus will cause the HIV to present multiple surface markers and by this help the body target the virus more efficiently.
I find a good benchmark is to look and see if there's outcry from within the scientific community. These days if something really is off-the-wall-crazy somebody from that field is going to be ranting about it and it won't be too hard to find.
If that quick little test fails, then what you're worrying about is that if you sail too far west that you'll fall of the edge of the world.
Remember that perhaps the most insidious things about HIV has been not its deadliness (which has been ameliorated by 20 years of research) but the fact that it can be contagious for a long time before it makes itself obvious: i.e., not its deadliness alone, but its delayed deadliness, giving it time to spread to other victims.
Agreed, there's like two stages to the virus. The first infects you (and almost everyone you have unprotected sex with) and only presents flu-like symptoms, then months or years later you'll prevent full blown HIV symptoms and this is when the virus is fighting you and mutating like crazy.
Consider, it already mutates a lot, and hasn't turned itself into something more deadly.