http://allafrica.com/stories/200305270503.html

Aids Vaccine Research is Encouraging - Dr Anzala

The Post (Lusaka)

May 27, 2003
Posted to the web May 27, 2003

Webster Malido in Nairobi
Lusaka

RESULTS under phase one of development of an HIV vaccine are encouraging so far, an HIV/AIDS researcher at the Kenya Aids Vaccine Initiative (KAVI) at Nairobi University's Medical School has disclosed.

During a tour by a group of 20 African journalists of the HIV/AIDS vaccine development laboratories at Nairobi University Medical School last Friday , KAVI project manager Dr. Omu Anzala disclosed that the vaccine had so far shown that it was not harmful to the human body.

Dr. Anzala said the vaccine was first tried on primates before being given to humans. Dr. Anzala said the phase one trial started in Nairobi in February 2001 with 18 HIV negative volunteers who are at low risk of becoming infected.

He said the purpose of the trial was to monitor the safety of the vaccine and to see how volunteers respond to the vaccine. The vaccine is a combination of two different vaccine constructs, the primary construct consisting of HIV DNA.

Dr. Anzala said this type of construct was administered in some of the volunteers in order to elicit a primary immunological response to the virus. He said the second construct based on Modified Vaccinia Ankara (MVA) was in progress, to boost the HIV DNA vaccine, while the third construct was a combination of a DNA MVA. Dr. Anzala said the vaccine was based on HIV subtype A, the main subtype circulating in Kenya. He said phase two of the process, which will aim at testing the vaccine's efficacy, would commence next year with at least 300 volunteers this time.

Dr. Anzala said the vaccine tests were being done concurrently at Nairobi University, Oxford University and in Uganda. He said it may take some time to try the vaccine's effectiveness and urged that people should continue taking preventive measures as there was currently no solution to the cure.

The KAVI is part of an international partnership and alliance to find an effective, safe and affordable vaccine against HIV/AIDS. Dr. Anzala took the 20 journalists from nine African countries around the KAVI laboratories being used for trying the AIDS vaccine at Nairobi University's Medical School, explaining all the processes involved in its development.

Under the AAVP, several countries have allocated resources to the global HIV vaccine research and development effort and there has been a wide range of HIV vaccine research taking place in Africa in partnership with international collaborators. World-wide, over 40 candidate vaccines have been evaluated in clinical trials in different countries.

The first phase trial in Africa was initiated in 1999 in Uganda, using a subtype B canary pox-HIV recombinant candidate vaccine. The trial involved 40 volunteers.