SA Aids vaccine trials begin
7 November 2003
A group of 24 South African volunteers made history in the country's fight against Aids this week when human clinical trials aimed at developing an Aids vaccine kicked off.
"This is our best hope in eradicating Aids from the globe" said Tim Tucker, director of the South African Aids Vaccine Initiative (SAAVI). "In the next 10 years we hope to develop an affordable and effective Aids vaccine."
A total of 48 participants will be involved in the first phase of the three-phase trials - 24 in South Africa and 24 in the United States.
According to Glenda Gray, national principal director of the HIV Vaccine Trial Network, the first phase will assess the safety of the vaccine and measure the immune system response it generates.
The vaccine being tested is the AlphaVax replicon Vector, which utilises parts of a weakened strain of the Venezuelan equine encephalitis (VEE) virus and a gene from a South African strain of HIV to deliver the
vaccine to the immune system.
The trials will take place at the Chris Hani-Baragwanath Hospital in Soweto and the SAAVI HIV vaccine research unit in Durban.
This is one of two candidate vaccines approved earlier this year for phase I testing by South Africa's Medicines Control Council. The second trial of the modified vaccinia Ankara (MVA) candidate vaccine, sponsored by the International Aids Vaccine Initiative (IAVI), is likely to also begin in the next few weeks, according to SAAVI.
The aim is to run multiple trials of promising candidates concurrently to fast-track the testing process and to contribute to scientific knowledge about which approaches have a greater chance of success.
Trials for the second vaccine are likely to begin in the next few weeks.
Andrew Robinson, of the SAAVI HIV vaccine research unit in Durban, said a stringent process had been followed in recruiting volunteers.
As the vaccine contains only a copy of a small section
of genetic material from HIV, and does not include the genetic elements needed to reconstitute live HIV, there is no possibility of the vaccine itself causing HIV infection, said Robinson. He added that the vaccine material is also designed so that its VEE components cannot generate the VEE virus or cause VEE infection.
The SAAVI was established by the government and Eskom in 1999 to co-ordinate the research, development and testing of HIV and Aids vaccines in the country.
Source: SA Aids Vaccine Initiative
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