HIV Vaccine Approved for Human Trials

[porchrat]

Should be interesting. It is a new approach to HIV vaccine generation using a genetically modified killed virus as opposed to the usual live virus vaccines. Lets hope it works.

LONDON, ONT. -

Canadian researchers have been given a green light to test a vaccine for HIV/AIDS on humans.

The approval from the Food and Drug Administration will lead to further tests that, if successful, could see a vaccine on the market in about five years, researchers from the University of Western Ontario said in announcing the milestone Tuesday morning at the campus in London. Ont.

The vaccine is the first based on a genetically modified, killed whole virus, following a line of research that successfully produced vaccines for polio, rabies and hepatitis A.

It is the only HIV vaccine currently under development in Canada, and one of only a few in the world, said the researchers.

Dr. Chil-Yong Kang and a team at the university, funded by pharmaceutical venture company Sumagen Canada, said approval by the American agency was crucial because its strict standards are generally regarded as a world standard.

A clinical trial on 40 HIV-positive volunteers will begin next month.

Those trials will be followed by tests on 6,600 HIV-negative but high-risk-category volunteers, testing immune responses and effectiveness of the vaccine in two more phases.

...

Source: http://www.torontosun.com/2011/12/20/canadian-universitys-aids-vaccine-wins-approval

 

[Ockie]

Erm....what good does it do to test it on positive people? Vaccines are for prevention...not cure?

I wonder how they select the volunteers? People that dont use condoms? If you use condoms then the chances are pretty slim to contract the virus in the first place...even without a vaccine. Just wondering aloud.

Anyways...hope this works too. I am so fcking tired of this damn virus! I also hope that that Draco drug comes through and lives up to its promise. Maybe then we can get rid of all these damn nasties.

 

[porchrat]

Erm....what good does it do to test it on positive people? Vaccines are for prevention...not cure?

This is the common understanding but it isn't strictly true. A vaccine is just something that improves immunity. A vaccine can be prophylactic or therapeutic.

So with HIV: Basically we're not able to combat HIV effectively because we can't mount an effective immune response against it. A vaccine would in ideal circumstances give us the ability to launch an effective immune response and we would actually see those already infected combating the virus and "curing" themselves like you do with other minor infections.

Hope this helps.

 

[Ockie]

This is the common understanding but it isn't strictly true. A vaccine is just something that improves immunity. A vaccine can be prophylactic or therapeutic.

So with HIV: Basically we're not able to combat HIV effectively because we can't mount an effective immune response against it. A vaccine would in ideal circumstances give us the ability to launch an effective immune response and we would actually see those already infected combating the virus and "curing" themselves like you do with other minor infections.

Hope this helps.

Ah..interesting. Thank you. Makes sense.

 

[porchrat]

Ah..interesting. Thank you. Makes sense.

Always happy to share some knowledge.

I have my doubts about this vaccine though. Viruses are tricky and HIV is especially tricky. It depends on how this vaccine was created as to whether or not it will be effective against all the various groups of HIV out there. (yes you read that right not all members of the same virus are identical in terms of what is effective against them).

Still I hope it works. I would love to live in a world where HIV wasn't a problem any longer. I'm tired of seeing loved ones die.

 

[Ninja'd]

So this is how the zombie apocalypse begins.

 

[Ockie]

Always happy to share some knowledge.

I have my doubts about this vaccine though. Viruses are tricky and HIV is especially tricky. It depends on how this vaccine was created as to whether or not it will be effective against all the various groups of HIV out there. (yes you read that right not all members of the same virus are identical in terms of what is effective against them).

Still I hope it works. I would love to live in a world where HIV wasn't a problem any longer. I'm tired of seeing loved ones die.

Ja...I knew at least that...that you get different mutations of HIV and that is why peoples meds have to be changes sometimes. Also why if you are HIV+ it is not a license to go bareback with other HIV+ people because you could get reinfected with a different strain.

I also have my doubts. There have been a few of these developments and they never seem to bare any fruit. It sucks. I am lucky though, I have not lost a single person I love or even know to HIV. For me it is always a fear though. Even though I am safe I always have sleepless nights waiting for my HIV test from the doc.

 

[porchrat]

So this is how the zombie apocalypse begins.

ROFL

 

[Sly21C]

Wouldn't it be better if HIV vaccines and cures for AIDS are never discovered? There's too many people in the world already.

Sent from my BlackBerry 8520

 

[R13...]

Wouldn't it be better if HIV vaccines and cures for AIDS are never discovered? There's too many people in the world already.

Sent from my BlackBerry 8520

Naive? Ignorant? Unclever?

 

[Velenoso]

Sent from my BlackBerry 8520

says it all! Hahaha

 

[Sly21C]

Naive? Ignorant? Unclever?

Naive, ignorant, unclever about what? About my wish that an HIV/AIDS cure to be never discovered or that there's too many humans in the world?

What we do need is an objective, ethical and discreet yet effective population control policy.

Some conspiracy theorists have pondered a possibility that AIDS was created by the west to keep the African population growth under control. Assuming that the claim is true, wouldn't that be an "objective" and "discreet" population control policy?

 

[porchrat]

Some conspiracy theorists have pondered a possibility that AIDS was created by the west to keep the African population growth under control. Assuming that the claim is true, wouldn't that be an "objective" and "discreet" population control policy?

Man I wish us scientists had access to this amazing technology of creating whole viruses for population control that must have existed in (considering the epidemiology of HIV) the 70s or 60s at least if not earlier.

Considering we only discovered the structure of DNA (let alone RNA and the enzymes around it's functioning such as reverse transcriptase) in the 1950s the idea that some secret government organisation had the ability at around that time to create entire viruses for a particular purpose is something I find completely loony.