The first HIV vaccine efficacy study is conducted in South Africa

The first HIV vaccine efficacy study that will last seven years to test whether the modification of the candidate vaccine can provide effective protection against the virus that causes AIDS started in South Africa, says the National Institutes of Health (NIH) on Monday, 28 November 2016.

The study is called HVTN 702 was intended to enroll approximately 5,400 men and women aged 18 to 35 who are sexually active, and make the largest and most sophisticated clinical trials of HIV vaccines place in South Africa, in which more than 1,000 people are infected with HIV every day.

A 3D look at the HIV virus. (Picture from: http://adf.ly/1gRfO1)

"When deployed together with our current weapons proven to prevent HIV, the vaccine is safe and effective could be the last nail in the coffin of HIV," said Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the NIH, and the organizers of these clinical trials.

"Even a moderately effective vaccine would significantly reduce the burden of HIV disease from time to time in countries and populations with high HIV infection rates such as South Africa."

The experimental vaccine regimen tested in HVTN 702 is based on the vaccine investigated in RV144 clinical trials in Thailand, showed that the vaccine was 31.2 percent effective in preventing infection during 3.5 years after vaccination.

The new vaccine regimen was adjusted to a prominent HIV subtype in Southern Africa and small preliminary clinical trials involving 252 people showed that it was safe for the study participants and the impact on the immune response comparable to that reported in RV144.

The new clinical trial conducted at 15 sites across South Africa aims to test whether the vaccine will provide greater protection and more continuous than the RV144 regimen.

Volunteers will be randomly be given the vaccine regimen that is still in the research or placebo. All participants will receive a total of five injections over a year and the results will be known late in 2020.

"HIV has claimed many deaths in South Africa, but now we begin scientific exploration could be very promising for our country," said Head of HVTN 702 Protocol Glenda Gray, who's also the president and chief executive of the Medical Research Council of South Africa.

"If the HIV vaccine successful in South Africa, it would dramatically change the course of the pandemic," she said as quoted by Xinhua news agency.

If you want to know briefly about HIV/AIDS (for men only), you can see it in The Manly Zone. *** [EKA | FROM VARIOUS SOURCES | NIAID | LIVESCIENCE | XINHUA NEWS]

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