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Moderna’s HIV vaccine has officially begun human trials

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Re: Moderna’s HIV vaccine has officially begun human trials

#441
post #429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And undetectable === untransmittable. Just in case people here didn't know.

> And undetectable === untransmittable. Just in case people here didn't know. In no way saying this is not a good thing, but do we know if this can be sustained for the whole lifetime? Or is it that 20, 30 years later, as people get older the person eventually gets AIDS?

As long as they take their daily ART pills, they are safe from AIDS in specific, which is basically a death sentence. But things are not black and white. Someone who has ever been HIV positive counts as immuno compromised for their entire life. Studies have shown that there is basically no shortening of life expectancy, if you start ART early enough in the process.

> if the person with HIV started ART with a CD4 count above 500, they would be expected to live to the age of 87 – a little longer than those without HIV.

https://www.aidsmap.com/news/mar-2020/yes-same-life-expectan...

Re: Moderna’s HIV vaccine has officially begun human trials

#442
post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why on earth do people get all uppity about the COVID vaccine requiring multiple shots? Basically every vaccine you've ever had (and you've likely had a lot ) required 2, 3, 4 or even periodic shots for your entire life. - Flu. Twice per year until age 9 then one per year, forever. - Td, one dose every 10 years, forever. - Tdap, 4 doses. - Pneumococcal, 2 doses. - Rotavirus, 2 or 3 doses. - Meningitis, 2 doses. - MMR…

Don’t get me wrong, I got my 3 Covid shots. But that’s within 6 months. No other vaccine is that frequent.

> Don’t get me wrong, I got my 3 Covid shots. But that’s within 6 months. No other vaccine is that frequent.

That's not at all true, though the number drops pretty low when you eliminate the various series for infants that have doses at something like 2, 4, and 6 months (and often a fourth at 12-15).

But even eliminating those, there's a 3-dose/6-month HPV vaccine series, and a 3-dose, 6-month series for Meningitis B for populations at elevated risk, and maybe others.

Re: Moderna’s HIV vaccine has officially begun human trials

#443
post #405
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to mention the long term effects of COVID are known and way worst that what a vaccine can give you. Vaccine are building an immune response, they're not drugs that try to cope the symptoms (eg. Panadol) and they are the safest drugs out there. Is so interesting how people eat Panadol and many other drugs like candies (without reading the KNOWN side effects - which are also nasty), while they focus so much on thin…

This is wrong. Covid has been around for 2 years. The vaccines for 1 year. We don’t know the long term effects of either. Vaccines were trialed for dengue fever that made the disease worse . Vaccines are NOT “the safest drugs out there”.

No post body was provided.

Re: Moderna’s HIV vaccine has officially begun human trials

#444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Viral load. Number of viral copies per volume of fluid. Merely exposing someone to a virus does not necessarily result in widespread infection. A low enough number of copies could be neutralized by the host's immune response before it has a chance to spread significantly. How low this number is depends on the virus. For example, COVID-19 load is higher in symptomatic patients. Chronic viral infections are managed by…

At that low virion count it’s more about the probability that a virion will attach to the correct CD4 receptor and be able to work inside the cell. It’s not about the host's immune system defeating or being defeated on a number basis.

To add to this, how many virions are needed for a successful replication to start depends on the virus.

https://www.virology.ws/2011/01/21/are-all-virus-particles-i...

Re: Moderna’s HIV vaccine has officially begun human trials

#445

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No, it wasn't I said "for Delta". If you read the rest of my comment I mentioned the upcoming Omicron vaccine too.

> said "for Delta". You said, well, exactly what I quoted, which was that variant-specific vaccines for Delta and Omicron were tried, found less effective than the the existing vaccines, and abandoned. That is false. > I mentioned the upcoming Omicron vaccine too. No, you said that after abandoning Delta/Omicron variant-specific vaccines, “they” decided to work on mixed Omicron/Alpha boosters. That is also false. Nov…

> which was that variant-specific vaccines for Delta and Omicron were tried, found less effective than the the existing vaccines, and abandoned

> It turned out that the original vaccine is as effective for Delta, so that work was shelved. Omicron, on the other hand, seems to be evading the immunity created by the Alpha vaccine, so they are actually planning to start producing an Omicron specific booster (or more correctly Alpha+Omicron) after FDA approval.

???????????

The thing he said may not have been strictly accurate but your claim about what he said is much less accurate than that.

Re: Moderna’s HIV vaccine has officially begun human trials

#446

As I understand it, the reason an HIV vaccine has been so difficult to create is that HIV mutates so easily. I understand the basics behind how mRNA vaccines are generated, but I don't understand why this approach would be expected to have any more success in evading the high mutation potential of HIV than other vaccine types. After all, it was even a concern with new coronavirus variants that the original Moderna va…

I’m not a doctor, but as a gay man: it’s my understanding HIV doesn’t mutate in the same way a disease like Covid does, at least not in the sense that there’s as many opportunities to spread (i.e. not airborne), so while HIV may actually mutate more in theory, it gets less chances to spread, so less completely-different variants become widespread. Also, as part of “stopping the spread” PrEP has existed for years. It’…

Truvada can be a bit hard on the kidneys. Before starting it you generally have to have some blood work done to check to see if you're likely to have issues, and at least for a period after starting it they usually want to do blood tests regularly to ensure the kidneys are functioning properly. So it's certainly not something that everyone can get.

Descovy appears to be better, but I think it's not approved everywhere yet.

Re: Moderna’s HIV vaccine has officially begun human trials

#448
This is going to unfortunately suffer the wrath of their last flu jab being mislabeled for efficacy, safety and longevity.

I'm not saying it doesn't work it clearly does cut deaths but I think public option is starting to irrevocably sway based on regions which pushed it first. Not to mention the "reduces transmission by X" number keeps dropping with more studies and data...

Re: Moderna’s HIV vaccine has officially begun human trials

#449

So all it took to get here was €10 bln from EU governments and $10 bln from the US government to push the rapid development of mRNA tech? Shouldn’t this be done regularly? How about $20 bln to finally get a good malaria vaccine?

Don't worry they'll have Africa sign a contract saying they can't sue when it turns out to not quite work as it's hyped to to.

Re: Moderna’s HIV vaccine has officially begun human trials

#450

I remember growing up being terrified of HIV/AIDS. The idea of something being permanent and transmissible via sex, and literally dismounting your immune defense to all other diseases on the planet... To this day it still terrifies me, even though the treatments have become so good. Each year it seems there are new stories about HIV research, and progress keeps being made. I pray for positive results and am really am…

Seriously! AIDS changed culture tremendously, and created a ton more fear around sex. If a vaccine is developed for it, it will be epochal -- like the introduction of Penicillin. A cure for AIDS is almost like a cure for cancer, or fusion power. It's one of those technological miracles you thought maybe wouldn't ever come. Or the Pill, or the Bomb. (I know antivirals have advanced tremendously, but very few people wo…

Well if it is "that revolutionary" I'm convinced the modellers need to readjust their 9billion peak human lives estimate.

I think HIV is probably only one of the reasons the developed nations cared about pushing contraception in the developing world. If that fear rather than education goes I think some regions will see population explosions...

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