change of course.
Ronald Desrosiers said NIH priorities for vaccines against the evil AIDS
Harvard News Services
BOSTON -. Two prominent researchers evaluated the downright depressing state of vaccine research against AIDS and urged the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to correct its course.
in the plenary discussions back-to-back at the 15th Conference on retroviruses and opportunistic infections today, Ronald Desrosiers, director of the New England Primate Research Center in around Southborough, said he thought the NIH - the largest funder of the research of vaccine against AIDS - had "lost its way," spending too much money on development and testing products and not enough on basic research. Virologist Neal Nathanson, professor emeritus at the University of Pennsylvania who formerly headed the Office of the NIH AIDS Research, echoed the plea Desrosiers that more money go to, innovative studies at risk.
The trigger for unusually harsh public criticism of the field came last fall when a vaccine against AIDS that many considered the best prospect in developing bombed in large clinical trials ( science , 16 November 07, p. 1048). Recapping this failure, Desrosiers, who is testing vaccines against AIDS in monkeys, went to claim that an effective vaccine is not even on the horizon. "None of the products in the pipeline any chance of being effective," said Desrosiers, because the field is hampered by many unknowns, such as understanding of the immune responses that a vaccine must elicit. "We must make a better job of making the clinical trial only products that show very promising. "
clinical studies receive about a third of the nearly $ 0 million that the NIH dedicated to the research of vaccine against AIDS year, the majority from the National Institute of allergy and infectious diseases (NIAID). in January, Desrosiers and 13 other private researchers wrote NIAID Director Anthony Fauci about their concerns that the field was the drift. "the letter was a good outside tweak something I was already thinking," said Fauci Science at the meeting here. Fauci said NIAID plans to organize a vaccine against AIDS day "summit" on March 25 to explore how to move forward. It will be open to the public and webcast. "The real question is the balance we want between research and development of discovery," Fauci said. "We need to take a time out."
Related Sites
- conference home page
- More information on vaccines against AIDS
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