Vaccines

Vaccination to activate a long term immune response has erradicated small pox, and has nearly eliminated polio as a human disease. Major efforts are underway to develop HIV vaccines.
The obsticles are formidable. HIV replicates very rapidly, and errors in reverse transcription rapidly change the virus.
The ability of the virus to remain a part of the cellular genome, and become activated when cells of the immune system become active means that infected individuals harbor virus for the lifetime of a person.
A major problem is that HIV causes a vigorous immune response that affords some protection against the virus, but the process of protection can also activate virus replication and cause the disease to progress. We don't know what aspects of the immune response afford protection, and what steps cause progression. If these are different, it should be possible to increase protection and decrease progression. Studies of the immune system and HIV remain a very high priority.