World's first patient cured of HIV dies after cancer returns

Timothy Ray Brown, the first person known to have been cured of HIV when he had a unique type of bone marrow transplant, has died in California after relapsing with cancer, his partner said.

"It is with great sadness that I announce that Timothy passed away ... this afternoon surrounded by myself and friends, after a 5 month battle with leukaemia," his partner Tim Hoeffgen said in a post on Facebook.

Brown, born in 1966, became known as the "Berlin Patient" after his HIV was eradicated by treatment there in 2007.