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Promising HIV vaccine passes phase one human trials with 90% success rate

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Re: Promising HIV vaccine passes phase one human trials with 90% success rate

#51

Post by ComputerGuru »

rdl wrote: post #43
joshklein wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tough part about vaccines is that they only protect the recipient from the disease if they get the vaccine, and they only eradicate the virus if everyone on the planet is vaccinated. The Science (making the vaccine) and cost (creating enough vaccine) are only two barriers. Getting everyone (and it really must be EVERYONE) to take the vaccine is a very challenging project. That's what makes the story of [edit: sma…

You don't need to get 100% vaccination to eliminate the disease; somewhere around 90% works, unless it's incredibly contagious and in a high density environment. "Herd immunity" protects the others -- basically, the disease itself can't spread if a sufficient number of people are vaccinated, so it dies out in a few generations (of the disease, not of humans).

From my classes in veterinary medicine, I believe the herd immunity is around the 80% mark, at least for livestock and their diseases.

Re: Promising HIV vaccine passes phase one human trials with 90% success rate

#52

Post by arethuza »

palish wrote: post #13
arethuza wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shingles can be very nasty - my mother had it after I had chickenpox. It was across her face and eyes - she was hospitalised and was on morphine for the pain.

Sorry to hear that about your mother. I hope everything turned out okay.

Yeah she made a remarkable recovery - she was left with a very slight scar on her forehead. However, she was still bothered by pain from the afflicted area for years after.

Re: Promising HIV vaccine passes phase one human trials with 90% success rate

#53

Post by eli »

I don't want to bum anyone out, but there have been quite a few potential vaccines that have made it through Phase 1 trials (several made it all the way to phase 3) only to be ultimately abandoned as ineffective or unsafe.

Phase 1 is generally a small trial that is primarily designed to test the safety of the drug, not its efficacy.

Re: Promising HIV vaccine passes phase one human trials with 90% success rate

#54

Post by ScottMFisher »

eli wrote: post #50
appendix_a wrote: post #48

how do you sign up people to be infected with HIV?

You don't. But given a large enough group of people, some will contract the infection "organically." So some people get a vaccine and some get a placebo and then you check back in years later and see if the vaccine group has a lower infection rate.

It says they used 30 people.

Re: Promising HIV vaccine passes phase one human trials with 90% success rate

#55

Post by eli »

scott_s wrote: post #27
joshklein wrote: post #11

My father is an infectious disease specialist who has spent the last 30 or so years working on HIV in research, patient treatment, and education. The following thought comes from my casual conversations with him, and probably does not represent his professional opinion. It certainly does not reflect his specific thoughts in regards to this trial, as we haven't yet discussed it. The progress in treating HIV since it f…

I'm confused by the statement that a vaccine would not be a game changer in terms of worldwide infection. Right now, the only way to reliably prevent HIV infection is through changing behavior , which is extremely difficult. But widespread use of a vaccine would just require a one-time injection, which is relatively easier. I'm further confused by your polio reference, because that sort of effort would only be possib…

Actually, circumcision is a proven way to reduce infection rates that doesn't involve behavior. Though, as one might imagine, it can be a tough sell in cultures where that isn't the norm.

Re: Promising HIV vaccine passes phase one human trials with 90% success rate

#56

Post by rflrob »

byoung2 wrote: post #36
gst wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shouldn't this be more of a temporary problem? As soon as there is a vaccine its patents will expire at least 20 years afterwards. And then lots of much cheaper vaccines will flood the market.

Shouldn't this be more of a temporary problem? As soon as there is a vaccine its patents will expire at least 20 years afterwards. And then lots of much cheaper vaccines will flood the market. I think his point is that much of the problem of preventing the spread of HIV has less to do with the science of killing the virus, and more to do with the difficulty of actually getting it in the hands of people who need it. T…

Proof of that is the fact that we can't even get water to all of these people.

Not sure how good an analogy this is. I suspect it would be moderately expensive (i.e. on the order of a few billion dollars), but possible to deliver a liter of clean water to nearly everyone in the developing world. The problem is, that solves their water problem for about 12 hours, if you're being generous. Solving their problem long term is the hard part. With vaccines, you only need to visit the people a finite number of times, and then you're done. Given that HIV is sexually transmitted (and assuming that the vaccine can be given relatively young), you wouldn't even need especially frequent visits to immunize the next generation of people.

Re: Promising HIV vaccine passes phase one human trials with 90% success rate

#57

Post by AlexandrB »

falcolas wrote: post #18
JVerstry wrote: post #14

Many in the scientific community claim there is no evidence HIV is actually causing AIDS. Hence, even if this is a successful vaccine, there is no guarantee it will protect from AIDS.

[citation needed] First I've ever heard of anything like this.

Unfortunately this idea seems more widespread than most people think. I know of 2 documentaries promoting this idea [1], and it still has it's followers. Of these, the scariest is probably the former president of South Africa [2].

Of all the pseudoscience and conspiracy theories in the world, I think this one bugs me the most, primarily because it has a real cost in human lives [3] (unlike moon landing or JFK conspiracies). Hopefully if/when a reliable vaccine is found, HIV can be wiped out for good and this will no longer be an issue.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Numbers

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Other_Side_of_AIDS

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thabo_Mbeki#AIDS

[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christine_Maggiore#Eliza_Jane

Re: Promising HIV vaccine passes phase one human trials with 90% success rate

#58

Post by epochwolf »

eli wrote: post #55
scott_s wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm confused by the statement that a vaccine would not be a game changer in terms of worldwide infection. Right now, the only way to reliably prevent HIV infection is through changing behavior , which is extremely difficult. But widespread use of a vaccine would just require a one-time injection, which is relatively easier. I'm further confused by your polio reference, because that sort of effort would only be possib…

Actually, circumcision is a proven way to reduce infection rates that doesn't involve behavior. Though, as one might imagine, it can be a tough sell in cultures where that isn't the norm.

Just because infection rates are lower among males who are circumcised doesn't mean it prevents infection. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_caus...

Re: Promising HIV vaccine passes phase one human trials with 90% success rate

#59

Post by rflrob »

appendix_a wrote: post #48

how do you sign up people to be infected with HIV?

In this case, they seem to be testing the blood for markers that should indicate an ability to repulse an HIV infection. Not the most scientifically informative experiment one can imagine, but also pretty straightforward ethically.

Re: Promising HIV vaccine passes phase one human trials with 90% success rate

#60

Post by scott_s »

joshklein wrote: post #38
scott_s wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm confused by the statement that a vaccine would not be a game changer in terms of worldwide infection. Right now, the only way to reliably prevent HIV infection is through changing behavior , which is extremely difficult. But widespread use of a vaccine would just require a one-time injection, which is relatively easier. I'm further confused by your polio reference, because that sort of effort would only be possib…

EDIT: I actually meant smallpox when I was talking about polio. That's a big error; corrected it above. Thanks rdl. I should have been more specific - I meant that if we did develop a vaccine, then it makes following the [smallpox] example theoretically possible, but this is still extremely challenging due to the reasons given. Although you and I might have the vaccine, not everyone has it - not by a long shot - beca…

I agree with that. Thanks for clarifying.
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