Aids drug trial report out in July
An interim analysis of the last phase of Aids vaccine trials conducted by the Public Health Ministry on 16,000 volunteers will be released in July, Dr Thawat Suntrajarn, director-general of the Disease Control Department, said yesterday.
Thawat said scientists in the United States were now analysing the results. Progress reports were discussed last week in meetings with US government agencies and drug companies involved in the trials in order to prepare a plan to deal with the outcome of the analysis. All agencies involved in the testing - including VaxGen, who created Aidsvax, and Aventis Pasteur, who make Alvac - will meet again in Thailand in June, said Thawat. Aidsvax and Alvac are major parts of the cocktail vaccine the Public Health Ministry has tested on Thais. Thawat said three courses of action were being considered: full-scale commercial vaccine production if test results show a success rate of more than 80 per cent; conducting tests for another two years if the success rate is from 50 to 79 per cent; and scrapping the project if the success level is below 50 per cent. Started in 2003, the trials used healthy and HIV virus-free volunteers, aged from 18 to 30. All volunteers are natives of Rayong and Chon Buri provinces. Each has received four vaccinations intended to boost the body's immune system against HIV infection.
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