WHO calls for AIDS vaccine testing co-operation
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has called for international co-operation on testing potential vaccines for HIV/AIDS because it is concerned that the current boom in research could exhaust available clinical trial capacity.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has called for international co-operation on testing potential vaccines for HIV/AIDS because it is concerned that the current boom in research could exhaust available clinical trial capacity.
WHO vaccine research director Marie-Paule Kieny has called for trials to be shared among a number of sites, each of whom were responsible for testing vaccines on a particular strain of the disease. She told a WHO meeting in Switzerland on HIV/AIDS vaccines that there was a pressing need to test vaccines around the world, because of the disease's genetic variability.
Despite more than 65% of worldwide infections being in sub-Saharan Africa, only four out of 70 phase I/II HIV vaccine clinical trials have taken place in the region.