World AIDS Day: Light To Unite

[CrimsonTide4]

I just found this article on Yahoo regarding a possible AIDS Vaccine in 2005.

Prepare Now for Future Vaccine, AIDS Expert Says
Mon Jul 8,10:58 AM ET

BARCELONA (Reuters Health) - A vaccine that offers at least partial protection against HIV ( news - web sites) could be available within a decade, but poor countries will be left without access for years longer unless manufacturing and distribution capacity is built now, a leading researcher said on Saturday.

At a meeting ahead of the 14th International AIDS ( news - web sites) Conference here, Dr. Seth Berkley, founder and president of the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI), said that an effective vaccine is the only way to end the pandemic, which threatens to kill more than 68 million people between 2000 and 2020.

"From our perspective, we now have a set of reasonable candidates," he told Reuters Health on the sidelines of the meeting. "I would say it's possible we could have a vaccine in as short as 6 months and as long as 5, 7, 10 years."

But the developing world could be left behind again, as it has been with expensive antiretroviral drugs, Berkley said. Ensuring quick global rollout of a vaccine requires the means of producing large amounts and having the facilities to distribute it.

"The critical issue is, if a vaccine turns out to look good but we don't have the manufacturing facilities, the delivery systems or the financing systems, what will happen is that we'll have 'Eureka! This great advance,' but we won't be able to use it for a very long time," Berkley explained.

"If you wait until the day we have a vaccine that works, it'll be 5 or more years before it gets to the places that need it," he added.

With 15,000 people a day contracting HIV, mostly in the developing world, each month equates to a quarter of a million people missing out on the protection a vaccine might offer, Berkley said.

"That's not a scientific problem, but a political problem--building the commitment to have what is a new paradigm, simultaneous North-South availability of an AIDS vaccine," Berkley stated.

"The challenge for politicians is that vaccines tend to have a longer timelines," he said. "The timeline of the average politician means they're not going to be around when these vaccines appear."

The results of studies with vaccines in early stages of clinical development are expected to be presented during the week-long conference. The most advanced candidate, AIDSVAX developed by US biotechnology company VaxGen, has been undergoing final Phase III tests in Thailand and results are expected by the beginning of 2003.

Another Phase III trial, of AIDSVAX combined with Aventis Pasteur's ALVAC vaccine, looks likely to go ahead within a year, also in Thailand. At the meeting, Supachai Rerks Ngarm from the Thai Department of Public Health ( news - web sites) said that results are expected by around 2006.

Other vaccines are in more preliminary phases, which means proof of their effectiveness is more distant.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...ids_vaccine_dc

[Honeykiss1974]

I read about this yesterday at work (I work for a hospital ) anyway, I just hope that some people DO Not interpret this to mean that it is safe OR ok to have unprotected sex (pre-marital or otherwise - for the adulters out there).

This is a virus, which means that it will mutate are it has become resistant to this current vaccine.

[ladygreek]

Originally posted by Honeykiss1974
I read about this yesterday at work (I work for a hospital ) anyway, I just hope that some people DO Not interpret this to mean that it is safe OR ok to have unprotected sex (pre-marital or otherwise - for the adulters out there).

This is a virus, which means that it will mutate are it has become resistant to this current vaccine.

You are so right! A vaccine protects against becoming infected. Right now there are no vaccines available to the public just treatments to manage the disease and it is those treatments that the virus is mutating to overcome. People resorted back to unsafe behaviors--unprotected sex with multiple partners, anonymous sex, sharing dirty needles, etc.-- because they think the treatments are a cure They are NOT.

If indeed a vaccine is developed (and noticed the article said "partial protection"), I fear that it will lead to a complete throwing of caution to the wind. HIV is a very smart virus and there is the chance that it mutates against even a vaccine.

Originally posted by Honeykiss1974
I read about this yesterday at work (I work for a hospital ) anyway, I just hope that some people DO Not interpret this to mean that it is safe OR ok to have unprotected sex (pre-marital or otherwise - for the adulters out there).

This is a virus, which means that it will mutate are it has become resistant to this current vaccine.

Honeykiss, I was thinking the same thing. I just know there are going to be idiots out there, who think this is the green light, for them to keep "spreading themselves" out. I don't understand how people can be so ignorant.

[lovele1978]

I don't see the difference between the access to the vaccine and the current cocktail medication in poorer countries. They are already struggling to get to some of the medication that we have readily available here in the US, and even some of the poorer people here that are dying from this virus are not getting it. If anything they should be the ones to get it first. But we all know how that is going to work out. The rich will get it first and the poor will get it last, that is how healthcare works in our society and it SUCKS!!!

I also agree that people will use this as the forcefiled against HIV. But we need to realize that there are other STD's that can stay with you for life.

[D'Chosen]

People need to understand that there are two forms of vaccines that are being investigated right now. Preventative and therapeutic vaccines. For a successful preventive vaccine to be developed all the 9 subtypes of the virus must be incorporated and some how prevent the virus from mutating once it get inside the body. So far we have not been able to redress both of this issues consistantly.

Currently there are a few vaccines candidate that are in phase III clinical trials. One of those key trials that was schedule to ran parallel to the Thailand study here in the US was halted!

[ladygreek]

Originally posted by D'Chosen
People need to understand that there are two forms of vaccines that are being investigated right now. Preventative and therapeutic vaccines. For a successful preventive vaccine to be developed all the 9 subtypes of the virus must be incorporated and some how prevent the virus from mutating once it get inside the body. So far we have not been able to redress both of this issues consistantly.

Currently there are a few vaccines candidate that are in phase III clinical trials. One of those key trials that was schedule to ran parallel to the Thailand study here in the US was halted!

I remember that a couple of years ago a few researchers/AIDS docs injected themselves with a vaccine as part of a trial. Are they the ones in phase III now or have you heard any updates on them?

[CrimsonTide4]

1st AIDS Vaccine in Large Test Found to Be Mostly Ineffective
By David Brown
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, February 24, 2003; Page A02

The first AIDS vaccine tested in a large population of people at high risk for the disease has proven to be largely ineffective, according to data released early today by the vaccine's manufacturer.

AIDSVAX reduced the rate of infection 3.8 percent in people receiving the vaccine, compared with those who received placebo injections, said VaxGen, based in Brisbane, Calif.. Vaccines generally need to be at least 70 percent effective in reducing infection from human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) to gain approval for widespread use. VaxGen officials had said that a real-world efficacy of 30 percent for AIDSVAX might be enough to make the product useful in some populations.

The vaccine appeared to be effective, however, in a subgroup of recipients, notably African Americans. Among them, 2 percent who received the vaccine became infected with HIV, compared with 8.1 percent who were given the placebo -- a statistically significant difference. When Asians and mixed-race volunteers were added to the group of blacks -- totaling, in all, about 500 of the 5,000 volunteers -- the protective effect was nearly as strong.

"It appears that blacks, Asians and the other non-white volunteers were able to induce a higher level of antibody than others. There appears to be a correlation between that and protection. We need to continue to do more analysis," VaxGen spokesman James Key said of that finding.
Company officials were not available to comment on what their next step will be. They scheduled two telephone conferences with reporters and investors today.

The vaccine was tested in 5,417 volunteers at high risk for HIV infection in the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico and the Netherlands. The company is testing a similar vaccine in Thailand, but the results of that study will not be known until later this year.

More than a dozen vaccines have been tested in small numbers of people for their ability to stimulate immunity or, in some cases, slow the progression of HIV infection. The AIDSVAX trial, however, was the first one to test a vaccine's ability to protect against infection in a large and diverse population of volunteers.

The vaccine consists of a protein, called gp120, that is on the outer surface of the AIDS virus and is one of many viral structures that stimulate production by the immune system of disease-fighting antibodies. In this case, the gp120 was made by recombinant DNA technology, not by extraction from the virus itself.

About twice as many people were randomly assigned to be given the vaccine as to receive a placebo, or inactive, immunization. The vaccination schedule consisted of three initial shots spaced three months apart, and then booster shots every six months. Although slightly more than 5,400 people were enrolled in the study, only 5,009 received at least three shots. The results announced today were limited to them.

Over three years, 5.7 percent of the people receiving AIDSVAX became infected with HIV, compared with 5.8 percent of people receiving the placebo shots.

It is unclear what significance the finding of variable efficacy among different racial groups might mean in terms of the vaccine's possible usefulness. Although some racial and ethnic groups are at higher risk for certain infections -- and therefore are more urgent targets for a vaccine's use -- licensing vaccines for specific racial groups is without precedent.

The volunteers in this trial consisted of 5,108 gay or bisexual men, and 309 women at high risk of HIV infection because they are the sexual partners of those men, or of intravenous drug users. All of the volunteers were given frequent counseling to practice safer sex, and not to count on protection from the vaccine.


© 2003 The Washington Post Company

[ladygreek]

From the StarTribune, 2/25/03

Minnesota AIDS experts who helped test an experimental vaccine say they are disappointed, but not surprised, that the vaccine didn't seem to work in a three-year study of more than 5,000 volunteers.

And they are skeptical about one of the findings disclosed this week: that blacks and Asians seemed to do better on the vaccine, known as AidsVax, than whites.

"You have to be very cautious," said Dr. Frank Rhame, an AIDS specialist at Minneapolis' Abbott Northwestern Hospital who led one of two AidsVax test sites in Minnesota. "Is there some reason that vaccines should work in African Americans and not in whites? I haven't seen an explanation."

Overall, "the effect of the vaccine was minimal," the vaccine's manufacturer, VaxGen Inc., said Monday. Its study -- the largest ever on an AIDS vaccine -- found no "significant reduction of HIV infection within the study population as a whole."

Yet two small groups did show a "statistically significant" drop in HIV infection, according to the company. After receiving the vaccine, black volunteers had 78 percent fewer infections, and non-Hispanic minorities had 67 percent fewer infections, than a control group, the study found. Subjects in the two groups also had higher levels of AIDS antibodies in their bloodstream than white subjects.

Experts say the racial gap may be a statistical fluke. At best, Rhame said, it calls for more study.

Dr. Keith Henry, who tested the vaccine at Hennepin County Medical Center, said "it's plausible" that genetic differences may explain the gap. But the evidence was marginal, and the overall results were "totally unimpressive," he said.

VaxGen, based in Brisbane, Calif., has spent $200 million developing the vaccine and said it hopes to someday help slow the spread of AIDS. On Monday, its stock price fell $6.16 a share, or 47 percent, to close at $6.86.

Henry said scientists were "lukewarm at best" about the vaccine all along. But he and others say it was worth testing because even a modest vaccine could help stem the epidemic.

"The major message to me is, there's not going to be any quick answer other than safe behavior," he said.

[1savvydiva]

Feb 25, 3:50 PM EST

Blacks Seen Wary of AIDS Vaccine Testing

By DEBORAH KONG
AP Minority Issues Writer

Researchers trying to learn more about why an AIDS vaccine appeared to work well in a small number of black volunteers may have trouble finding people for further studies, advocates and educators warn.

Suspicion of medical research runs deep among many blacks, they say, and the reason can be summarized in one word: Tuskegee.

In the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, conducted by the federal government between 1932 and 1972, researchers withheld medical treatment from poor, black men in Macon County, Ala., for experimental purposes. The men were not told they had syphilis, and weren't treated for the disease even after penicillin became available. By the time the study was exposed, 128 men had died of syphilis or related complications.

More than 30 years later, the damage done by that study still lingers, black activists say - even hindering efforts to halt the AIDS epidemic.

"Many African-Americans are suspicious of the health care system and suspicious of doctors and scientists because there's a legacy of mistreatment," said Phill Wilson, executive director of the Los Angeles-based Black AIDS Institute.


"Even though people may or may not know the specifics of the Tuskegee trials, they know that there are health disparities and that blacks often get inferior treatment based on race."

J. Lawrence Miller, executive director of the Black Educational AIDS Project in Baltimore calls it the "Tuskegee mentality."

"That distrust has become cultural," Miller said. "How do you fight culture? You can't, except for education."

Blacks have been hit harder by AIDS than any other racial or ethnic group in America. They represented about half of new HIV cases reported in the United States in 2001 - the largest of any group, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"Given the disproportionate impact that the AIDS epidemic has on black people, we stand to gain the most by the development of an effective HIV/AIDS vaccine," Wilson said. "We need to do a better job of recruiting black volunteers for these clinical trials."

Blacks made up just 6 percent of the 5,009 volunteers who participated in VaxGen Inc.'s AIDS vaccine experiment.

The experiment showed that there were 78 percent fewer infections among black volunteers who took the vaccine than in those who received a placebo.

In whole numbers, that meant four of the 203 blacks who received the vaccine became infected while nine of the 111 who received the placebo were infected. The company said those results were statistically significant and showed that the vaccine has value. But some observers warned that the sample size was too small.

There were similar results among the small number of Asians involved in the study.

VaxGen spokesman Jim Key said it was difficult for the company to recruit minority participants.

"There was still considerable skepticism among people of color regarding medical research and specifically regarding HIV vaccine research. There are so many myths and fears and conspiracy theories regarding HIV," Key said. "My hope is that this will be a catalyst."

Pernessa Seele, founder of The Balm in Gilead, a nonprofit that works with black churches to stop the spread of AIDS, agreed that the "small numbers of blacks in the study clearly indicates how reluctant African-Americans are" to participate in trials.

"Because of our history, we really believe it's another opportunity to take advantage of black people," she said.

That suspicion is so pervasive that some blacks believe HIV was designed to kill them - either by the government or other white institutions, Seele said. Medical professionals and AIDS activists try to dispel such ideas.

Steve Wakefield, of the HIV Vaccine Trials Network, worries that if too few blacks participate in research, scientists won't have enough information to help people, both here and in Africa.

Wakefield, the network's associate director for community relations, said he is always asked about Tuskegee when he makes presentations to minority groups in this country.

In Africa, "the one question I get asked from country to country is 'How many black Americans have already taken this product or been in research with this?'" said Wakefield, who is black.

While studies continue to document disparities in health care between American blacks and whites, much has changed since the Tuskegee study, he said. In government-sponsored trials, there are now volunteer community advisory boards that monitor safety - and informed consent is required.

But Seele believes that vaccine research also must include more black scientists.

"It is very important," she said, "to have black folks in research who understand black culture - who understand some of the fundamental beliefs we have in our community."

---

[CrimsonTide4]

Irish Scientist Discovers New Strain of AIDS Virus
34 minutes ago Add Science - Reuters to My Yahoo!


DUBLIN (Reuters) - An Irish scientist has discovered a new strain of the HIV virus (news - web sites) that may provide vital clues in the hunt for a vaccine.


University researcher Grace McCormack came upon the previously unknown virus type while researching blood samples from Malawi, dating back from the early years of the AIDS (news - web sites) epidemic in the 1980s.

"It is very interesting because while we have found people infected with it in the 1980s, we haven't found any examples of it in the 1990s yet," said McCormack, a lecturer at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth.


"As a result, it might be a strain of the virus that has failed. Because of that it may give us information on how to defeat the virus."

There are nine known strains of HIV (news - web sites), the virus that causes AIDS and infects 15,000 people a day worldwide.


AIDS has killed 25 million people around the world and is forecast to kill 80 million by 2010. The only real hope of fighting the disease is a vaccine, but efforts to date have failed although dozens are being tested.


The university publicized McCormack's findings Monday after they were published in AIDS Research and Human Retroviruses, the official journal of the International Retrovirology Association.


The hope is that the discovery, the result of three years of research, could help with the prevention and control of the epidemic and even with the development of a vaccine to combat the deadly virus.


"We haven't called it anything yet and we can't name it until we look at the full genome sequence," McCormack said.


"We've applied for funding and we hope to have concluded the research in the next three years, if not sooner."


McCormack's research was carried out with help from the Central Public Health Laboratory and School of Tropical Medicine, both based in London.

[FeeFee]

HIV/AIDS Made In America? - Graves Gets His Day In Court
>Ian Gurney
>June 23, 2003
>
> _____
>
>This week in California a lawyer is suing the U.S. government, claiming
>that the HIV-AIDS virus is a man made virus developed and manufactured
>in the United States with the knowledge of the U.S. government. On June
>27th. prominent lawyer and AIDS researcher, Dr. Boyd E Graves JD* will
>finally present his case, number 02 CV 02396**, before Judge Jeffrey T.
>Miller in a San Diego court, claiming that the HIV virus, the virus that
>causes AIDS, is a virus that was manufactured in American laboratories
>between 1962 and 1978. On November 27th. last year the Office of the
>Secretary of the United States Department of Health and Human Services
>granted Dr. Graves sixty days to file suit in the United States federal
>court against the U.S. government. Graves claims he has hundreds of
>government documents proving HIV-AIDS was designed as biological
>terrorism against African-Americans. His action was initially brought in
>the U.S. Supreme Court, Case No. 00-9587.***
>Researchers have long suspected that HIV arose as a result of a viral
>"cross-species jump" from primates to humans. The theory is that,
>through contact with chimpanzee blood, possibly through hunting them and
>eating the meat, humans were exposed to Simian Immunodeficiency Virus
>(SIV) which mutated into Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV). Not
>everyone agrees with this theory, and recently it has been challenged by
>Dr. Graves, who believes he has discovered the most terrifying inference
>about HIV-AIDS. Graves claims it is becoming increasingly clear that
>this virus was not, as scientists at first thought, passed from
>chimpanzees to mankind, but was probably knowingly developed by doctors
>and scientists working for the United States government. Graves says
>that in April 1984, Dr. Robert Gallo filed a United States patent
>application for his invention, the HIV-AIDS Virus. The Patent number for
>the invention is 4647773, details of which can be found at the US Patent
>Office website.****
>According to Graves, the scientific evidence is compelling. He says:
>"The HIV-AIDS Virus was manufactured as a designer bi-product of the US
>Special Virus programme. The Special Virus programme was a federal virus
>development programme that persisted in the United States from 1962
>until 1978. Dr. Robert Gallo's 1971 Special Virus paper reveals that the
>United States was seeking a "virus particle" that would negatively
>impact the defence mechanisms of the immune system. The programme sought
>to modify the genome of the virus particle in which to splice in an
>animal wasting disease called Visna." Graves says Dr. Gallo's 1971
>Special Virus paper is identical to his 1984 announcement of AIDS, and
>in 2001 Dr. Gallo conceded his role as "Project Officer" for the federal
>virus development programme, the Special Virus.
>Graves claims the US Special Virus was added as a "compliment" by
>vaccine manufacturer Merck to experimental hepatitis B vaccines given to
>gay men in New York City, Los Angeles and San Fransisco; and smallpox
>vaccines given to blacks in central Africa, during the late 1970's and
>early 1980's. Shortly thereafter the world was overwhelmed with mass
>infections of a human retrovirus that differed from any known human
>disease, it was highly contagious and it could kill. Boyd Graves now
>believes that HIV-AIDS is probably an evolutionary, laboratory
>development of the peculiar Visna Virus, first detected in Icelandic
>sheep. Graves himself is a graduate of Annapolis US Naval Academy and
>law school who, in 1992 tested positive for HIV.
>"Today I am hailed as "the Man Who Solved AIDS", he says. "What many
>people do not understand is that HIV contains particles of an Icelandic
>sheep disease, VISNA. Visna is from nazi Germany. It too is man made.
>The Supreme Court case was brought from a lower court which dismissed
>the origin of AIDS as a frivolous issue. I do not believe anyone in the
>world considers the origin of AIDS frivolous."
>He claims to have one piece of evidence he's convinced will force the
>judge to rule in his favour saying: "If that happens the government will
>be forced to release all sorts of previously-classified research which
>proves the real origins of HIV-AIDS. The United States must account to
>the American people and the people of the world for the U.S. Special
>Virus Program."
>In a new report, UNAIDS, the United Nation's joint program on HIV-AIDS,
>says that an estimated 45 million people worldwide are now living with
>HIV. UNAIDS executive director Peter Piot said: "Within the first 20
>years, 58 million people have become infected and 23 million have been
>killed by HIV-AIDS." So, if Boyd E Graves is to be believed, and on June
>27th. he can try to prove his case in the US federal court, it appears
>that HIV-AIDS may be a virus that has been manufactured and utilised by
>doctors and scientists with the knowledge and co-operation of the
>government of the United States of America. If this were to be proved
>true, two questions emerge. Firstly, for what reason was such a deadly
>virus invented? Secondly, according to all the laws governing the
>manufacture, development and deployment of biological and chemical
>weapons, was the invention and use of the HIV-AIDS virus by the United
>States the first act of mass bio-terrorism the world has witnessed?
>Links:

[RedefinedDiva]

I "read" the patent. It is full of jargon that only doctors or those skilled in the area can understand. I saw that the article said something about the virus being started to kill African-Americans, but it really didn't support that statement with evidence. I need more proof than this little article. Maybe I'll follow the case to see how it turns out....

[CrimsonTide4]

December 1st is World AIDS Day. . .when were you last tested? Commit to getting tested ASAP!!

~~~~~~
HIV Infection in Minority Populations

Provided by National Institute of Allergy & Infectious Diseases

Overview

Racial and ethnic minority populations in the United States, primarily African Americans and Hispanics, constitute 61 percent of the more than 830,000 cases of AIDS reported to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) since the epidemic began in 1981. African Americans make up 41 percent of all AIDS cases reported in the United States, yet according to the U.S. Census Bureau, they comprise only 12 percent of the U.S. population. Hispanics represent 19 percent of all AIDS cases and are approximately 13 percent of the U.S. population. Injection drug use is a major factor in the spread of HIV in minority communities. Other factors contributing to the spread of HIV/AIDS in these communities include men who have sex with men (MSM) and increasingly, heterosexual transmission.

According to CDC

As of December 2002, African Americans and Hispanics represented 57 percent of males living with AIDS and 78 percent of those in females.
As of December 2002, 59 percent of all women reported with AIDS are African American and 19 percent are Hispanic.
African American children represent almost 59 percent of all pediatric AIDS cases.
Of the 92 pediatric AIDS cases reported in 2002, 82 (89 percent) were in African Americans and Hispanics.
AIDS is the leading cause of death among African-American men ages 25-44.



Get tested and wrap it up!!!

[Love_Spell_6]

Originally posted by CrimsonTide4
December 1st is World AIDS Day. . .when were you last tested? Commit to getting tested ASAP!!

and increasingly, heterosexual transmission.

According to CDC

As of December 2002, African Americans and Hispanics represented 57 percent of males living with AIDS and 78 percent of those in females.
As of December 2002, 59 percent of all women reported with AIDS are African American and 19 percent are Hispanic.
African American children represent almost 59 percent of all pediatric AIDS cases.
Of the 92 pediatric AIDS cases reported in 2002, 82 (89 percent) were in African Americans and Hispanics.
AIDS is the leading cause of death among African-American men ages 25-44.



Get tested and wrap it up!!!

I still am floored when i hear the stats regarding HIV/AIDS and the African American community. I can't believe that people are still having unprotected sex in this day and age. A lot of folks say its because of the switch-hitters (Bisexual men in the closet)..but who knows...it all boils down to the brothas not wrapping it up and the women allowing it.