I like how some people refer to such things as being so simple when infact the universe we know is actually very complex and no generalizations can sufficient account for all the properties.

I found this in the following link from the cdc:

"Both HA and NA regions encompassed a sufficient number of polymorphic sites to define subtypes."

http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol12no04/05-1441.htm

I decypher from the following article that the Influenza virus(flu) is a polymorphic virus. I suspect evolution has made these viruses become very smart at outsmart our immune system as it only recognizes the last viral signature or antigen. It can take days to produce the proper and correct antibodies to a new virus.

I don't have a degree in this line of stuff but I do know we severly under estimate the evolution process and adaptation of viruses. I believe new viral strains are created every year of the flu which we try to adapt vaccinations against the 13 most major ones but don't always succeed in covering all the new strains and we might be causing them to adapt faster also by doing so.

In short, I think we have alot to learn before making dumb assumptions. Viruses might always be the thorn in our side which we may never completely get rid of them as they are the great equalizer or balancing force in nature. Look at Mumps...1,100 new cases just popped up...in people who were injected with the MMR vaccinations.

I think there can be a way. No one really tries much for the cold virus, because quite frankly, it's not all that deadly and we've lived with it for thousands of years (i think). There's a cure for everything, the question is just whether or not it's attainable within a reasonable period of time.

If we do find the cure for HIV, it's most likely a drug which targets a very essential viral protein in a certain way. Specifically, it'd inhibit the protein in such a way that in order to gain resistance to the drug, the virus would have to mutate the protein to a nonfunctional version of the protein. Thus, if it the virus doesn't get mutations to protect itself from the drug, it'll "die", but if it does get mutations, the protein can't function any longer and it'll still "die."

If you do some reading, this seems to be what happens with a certain enzyme called lysin. Bacteriophages (viruses which infect bacteria) use this enzyme to break up the bacteria's cell wall in order to escape and spread. When they tested this class enzymes as an antibiotic in the laboratory, they got no detectable bacteria which could survive treatment with the enzyme. What probably happened was that the bacteriophages, over millions of years, evolved an enzyme which both killed the bacteria and is difficult to adapt to. If there's a mutation in the target of this enzyme, the bacteria dies because of how vital the target is. If it doesn't adapt to it, the enzyme kills it.

Getting kinda long, i know =P If that doesn't turn out to be the case, I personally think using modified viruses to modify our DNA will be capable of curing MANY diseases. This might be in the somewhat distant future, though, since there doesn't seem to be much interest in this field atm. But when it does get developed, there could probably be some way where you can literally just delete or overwrite any viral DNA which got introduced, and voila, virus is gone. of course, it's not as easy as i made it seem, but i think this method has a lot of potential.

V.S.S.SARMA, smallpox is a virus - a particularly nasty one, as I'm sure you know.

We have eradicated smallpox. Completely. With enough effort, we can do the same for any disease.

The reason we don't attempt a cure for the common cold is because doing so would be prohibitively expensive, and a cold merely causes mild discomfort. Palliative medicine works out much cheaper.

You seem to be taking an entirely negative view. Vaccination would be an important part of any eradication program. Unfortunately, HIV works in a very different way to smallpox, and currently there is no vaccine. It seems likely that a live or attenuated vaccine will never work, although a synthetic vaccine is a vague possibility. Of course, if there were a vaccine, (or even the possibility of one) then you would be entirely correct.

But the work we are doing here is entirely new. Why predict failure without understanding what is being done? At the very, very, worst, we will rule out a large number of possible drugs, allowing research and funding to be diverted to other avenues of HIV research.

(A minor correction: smallpox was eradicated by 1979, not 1971.)