HIV vaccine trial fails

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India's first human trial of AIDS vaccine fails

CNN-IBN, Sat, Nov 24, 2007

Pune: Just days before the International AIDS Day, scientists have faced

disappointment with one of the most anticipated AIDS research project in the

country.

The National AIDS research Institute in Pune has put an end to the India's first

and biggest, human trial of an AIDS vaccine.

The institute said that the first phase of the human trials, which started in

2005, has failed.

Thirty volunteers were injected with a vaccine, called the Adeno-Associated

Virus Vector. But 80 per cent of the volunteers failed to respond to it.

NARI Director, Dr Ramesh Paranjape, said, " The immediate capacity of the vaccine

that is to produce immune response was not found to be very high with this

vaccine. Hence, we are not going to phase two of this vaccine. "

The vaccine trial was divided into three phases:

Phase 1: 30 volunteers are tested with the vaccine

Phase 2: If the first phase produces desirable results, 500 volunteers are given

the vaccine.

Phase 3: Thousands of volunteers are tested before certifying the vaccine as

successful.

However, researchers are still positive. " This is not the end of the road, " said

Dr Paranjape, for another trial underway at Chennai's TB Research Centre may

bring results that their vaccine test could not.

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