May 29, 2008

French Researcher Says AIDS Vaccine Far Off

A French AIDS researcher has raised doubts that an effective HIV vaccine will be found in the near future, the online news service Xinhua News Agency reports (xinhuanet.com, 5/28).

“The development of a preventive or therapeutic vaccine against HIV has still a long way to go and is certainly one of the most difficult challenges facing the world’s scientific community today,” said the director of France’s National Agency for Research on AIDS and Viral Hepatitis (ANRS), François Delfraissy, to reporters in Dakar, Senegal, on May 27.

Still, Delfraissy said he hasn’t given up hope, citing a vaccine that the ANRS has been developing for the past 10 years. “We must continue to move forward in our search for a better understanding of immune mechanisms, improve available vaccine candidates [and] assess their tolerance and immunogenicity using clinical trials,” he said.

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