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Promising HIV vaccine passes phase one human trials with 90% success rate
- grannyg00se 15y ago"if this genetic cocktail passes Phase II and Phase III future clinic trials, and makes it into production, in the future HIV could be compared to herpes virus nowadays". As far as I know there is no herpes vaccine and herpes stays with you for life resulting in recurring problems. Doesn't quite sound like a very flattering comparison to an effective vaccine solution.
- shin_lao 15y agoChickenpox is a form of herpes and we all have it. What matters is that it's harmless.
- bhickey 15y agoWhile it won't probably kill you, it isn't exactly harmless. It can reemerge as shingles. There are cases of herpes causing death. For example, in an infant infected by his mohel, and a laboratory researcher killed after exposure to monkey feces. (http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00056008.htm http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00056008.htm)
- lallysingh 15y agoYes, but those cases are much, much less worrisome than AIDs in its current state.
- arethuza 15y agoShingles can be very nasty - my mother had it after I had chickenpox. It was across her face and eyes - she was hospitalised and was on morphine for the pain.
- axxl 15y agoI had it when I was younger, and I heard it only gets worse if you get it when you're older. It was pain unlike anything I've experienced since, I can't imagine what it felt like for her.
- dkersten 15y agoI had it under my ear when I was young. I don't remember how painful it was and it healed perfectly (ie no scars or anything). I guess I probably only had a mild case.
- palish 15y agoSorry to hear that about your mother. I hope everything turned out okay.
- arethuza 15y agoYeah she made a remarkable recovery - she was left with a very slight scar on her forehead. However, she was still bothered by pain from the afflicted area for years after.
- maaku 15y agoMy aunt had nearly the same thing happen to her--it left her with no visible scars (at least none that she told me about), but blind in one eye. The reason medical professionals recommend parents let their children catch chickenpox is because it the symptoms get worse the older you are. In your later years it can even be life-threatening. Never underestimate the chickenpox!
- carbocation 15y agoVaricella pneumonia? Encephalitis? The virus that causes chicken pox is not harmless.
- bitwize 15y agoIt's not harmless and there is a varicella vaccine now. (There wasn't when I was a kid.)
- jonknee 15y agoPretty sure they're talking about the still annoying but no death part.
- kokey 15y agoAround 1 in 4 or 5 women in the UK have herpes. I think the stats are similar for the US. It's still a problem, but most people suffer little from having it. It still has a stigma attached to it, hence why people don't admit to it, which makes me think the comparison with HIV is a fairly good comparison.
- maaku 15y agoI'm pretty sure the author meant hepatitis, which is much more similar to HIV in many regards, and now effectively “solved”, although the global vaccination program is still underway.
- scarmig 15y agoAsk anyone who has HIV whether they'd trade it for herpes.
- grannyg00se 15y agoThat's not the comparison being made. It's not HIV vs herpes - it's HIV with a highly successful vaccine available vs herpes, which has no vaccine.
- sgentle 15y agoEasy to miss: "The recent human trials involved 30 healthy volunteers, where 24 were treated with MVA-B, while the other 6 were treated with a placebo, carried out over a 48 week period." This test was done on healthy volunteers, not ones with HIV. Although it's promising that 90% of the patients showed an immune response, we don't know how well that immune response translates into therapeutic benefit until it's trialled on HIV-positive patients.
- palish 15y agoIsn't the point of a vaccine to prevent, not cure? EDIT: thanks guys, but I have enough upvotes. My comment didn't add much to HN. Wasn't actually trying to prove him wrong -- I thought I'd missed something and was asking for clarification.
- corin_ 15y agoYes, that is the point - somewhat ironically missed by the "easy to miss" comment's owner.
- sgentle 15y agoHa, oops. I don't know how I managed to mix up vaccine and cure - my brain must be asleep. Thanks for pointing it out.
- palish 15y agoNo worries. I get mixed up every day.
- burgerbrain 15y agoThat certainly is the common point, however (provided the patient is strong enough to survive the additional initial strain) shouldn't it also kickstart an immune response in patients who are already infected? And once that starts, shouldn't that likely help fight the infection? I don't know myself, I know next to nothing about medicine.
- joshklein 15y agoMy father is an infectious disease specialist who has spent the last 30 or so years working on HIV in research, patient treatment, and education. The following thought comes from my casual conversations with him, and probably does not represent his professional opinion. It certainly does not reflect his specific thoughts in regards to this trial, as we haven't yet discussed it. The progress in treating HIV since it first entered the popular psyche has been significant. It is no longer a death sentence in the developed world, and those infected with HIV - who get treatment and adhere to that treatment - can live long and relatively normal lives. The real problem is in the developing world, and amongst populations in the developed world that cannot or will not seek/adhere to treatment. Treatment is sufficiently advanced that, while further developments of a vaccine are unbelievably exciting, they are not necessarily a game-changer in terms of worldwide infection. We have a long way to go in terms of beating this virus. Theoretically, we could follow the same route as with [edit: smallpox], unifying and mobilizing the world to isolate and then eradicate pockets of the disease, but this is a much larger effort than the one taking place in the lab, and is a question of government & administration, rather than medicine. Edit: Bringing it up from a comment I made below, here is a relevant TED Talk on stopping pandemics: http://www.ted.com/talks/larry_brilliant_wants_to_stop_pandemics.html http://www.ted.com/talks/larry_brilliant_wants_to_stop_pande...
- gst 15y agoShouldn't this be more of a temporary problem? As soon as there is a vaccine its patents will expire at least 20 years afterwards. And then lots of much cheaper vaccines will flood the market.
- burgerbrain 15y agoAnd with any luck by that time everyone who has it but refuses to seek treatment will be dead, and everyone else will have been exposed to years of news about the vaccine.. and years of people refusing to take it dying. I think things should work out well in the end, but it might take a while.
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- JVerstry 15y agoMany in the scientific community claim there is no evidence HIV is actually causing AIDS. Hence, even if this is a successful vaccine, there is no guarantee it will protect from AIDS.
- falcolas 15y ago[citation needed] First I've ever heard of anything like this.
- burgerbrain 15y agoI've heard it before... unfortunately. It is well within "nutjob territory". It's a fair statement to say that no credible scientist in the field honestly believes this.
- MaxGabriel 15y agoI heard about this when reading the (non-peer reviewed) journal Medical Hypotheses http://hivskeptic.wordpress.com/2009/07/12/official-italian-data-no-causal-connection-between-hiv-and-aids/ http://hivskeptic.wordpress.com/2009/07/12/official-italian-... However, the article was withdrawn by Medical Hypotheses later http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2009/09/pity_poor_peter_duesberg_even_medical_hy.php http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2009/09/pity_poor_peter_du...
- davidmathers 15y agoIt was a late 80's / early 90's thing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duesberg_hypothesis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duesberg_hypothesis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIDS_denialism#History http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIDS_denialism#History
- Symmetry 15y agoWell, it was a late 80s / early 90s thing among people who weren't crackpots. As evidenced by the OP, some people are reluctant to abandon the idea even though there is now overwhelming evidence against it.
- appendix_a 15y agohow do you sign up people to be infected with HIV?
- eli 15y agoYou don't. But given a large enough group of people, some will contract the infection "organically." So some people get a vaccine and some get a placebo and then you check back in years later and see if the vaccine group has a lower infection rate.
- ScottMFisher 15y agoIt says they used 30 people.
- timr 15y agoPhase 1 trials are for safety, not efficacy -- they don't care if the participants are infected with HIV, because they only want to make sure that the vaccine doesn't hurt them.
- rflrob 15y agoIn this case, they seem to be testing the blood for markers that should indicate an ability to repulse an HIV infection. Not the most scientifically informative experiment one can imagine, but also pretty straightforward ethically.
- maaku 15y agoActually, since HIV infects the blood (white blood cells, specifically), it's a rather accurate measure of its effectiveness.
- eli 15y agoI don't want to bum anyone out, but there have been quite a few potential vaccines that have made it through Phase 1 trials (several made it all the way to phase 3) only to be ultimately abandoned as ineffective or unsafe. Phase 1 is generally a small trial that is primarily designed to test the safety of the drug, not its efficacy.
- tedkalaw 15y agoTrue. It would be interesting to see what the success rate of reported cures, etc in the media is. I like hearing about scientific progress like this, but worry that it will be another "promising advancement" that we never hear about again, like a new cure for cancer or tax cuts for the middle class.
- deepakINdc 15y agoSeveral valid points already made here: 1. Phase 1 is for safety 2. 30 is a small number But the big issue here is the reason HIV and even the common cold is hard to treat -- high turnover and high rates of mutation. So, even if you have Ab's and/or helper T cells (cell that remember an infection) against one or more strains of HIV, the presentation of the strain that an individual may pick up later on in life may be different and thus might not mount an immune response. Also of interest -- Helper T-cell sare the primary target of HIV. In order to really determine if or not this vaccine is effective, we will have to observe the responses in people who have been given the vaccine and then contracted HIV later in life. While this is promising and will add another barrier against HIV, its unlikely to eradicate the virus.
- FameofLight 15y agoFinally we are in close stage to contain , one of the unknown virus in human history.
- kingkawn 15y agoHere's a short presentation on clinical trial success rates: http://insidebioia.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/bio-ceo-biomedtracker-bio-study-handout-final-2-15-2011.pdf http://insidebioia.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/bio-ceo-biome...