HIV/AIDS Vaccine Results Promising

By Charles Wendo THE HIV/AIDS vaccine that is due to be tested in Uganda has shown promising signs in a trial currently going on in Kenya, a researcher said yesterday. Dr. Omu Anzala, of the Kenya AIDS Vaccine Initiative, said they had detected in the vaccinated individuals blood cells that kill HIV. He said this was a preliminary sign that the candidate vaccine might succeed in protecting human beings from HIV infection. Speaking at the Kampala International Conference Centre during the Global Strategies for the Prevention of Mother-to-Child HIV Transmission conference yesterday, Anzala said they are currently testing the DNA vaccine on a small number of volunteers in Kenya. The five-day conference ended yesterday. Anzala said, “After a short time, people who were given the DNA vaccine begun to show a good response.” He, however, said the trial is only in the first phase and there would be a total of four phases in succession. “It is a long road. It is a difficult road. It takes long to move from one phase to another,” he said. Dr. Pontiano Kaleebu, the lead researcher in the upcoming trial of the vaccine in Uganda, yesterday said in a phone interview with The New Vision that he was happy about the revelation. “I haven’t seen the data myself but people who have seen it say it is exciting. If it is true, that is very good for us,” he said. Kaleebu, an immunologist at the Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI), confirmed that the same vaccine will be tested in Uganda in a joint effort by the Government of Uganda and the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI). The two parties last month signed an agreement to carry out the trials, to be based at UVRI in Entebbe. While in Kampala last month, IAVI President Dr. Seth Berkley, said the first volunteers in Uganda would receive the DNA vaccine by the beginning of next year. It is the first vaccine designed for the sub-type of HIV that exists in East Africa. The vaccine was designed to make the recipient develop immunity in a manner similar to Kenyan prostitutes who continuously had unprotected sex with HIV-infected men but did not have the virus. When scientists examined their blood, they were found to have HIV killer cells in their bodies. Ends