Preventive HIV-1 Vaccines

Abstract

The World Health Organization (WHO) has estimated that 40 million individuals are living with HIV-1 as of 2003 (UNAIDS/WHO, 2003). In addition, approximately 14,000 people are newly infected with HIV-1 each day, worldwide (UNAIDS/WHO, 2003). Thus, there is tremendous public health interest in developing safe and effective preventive HIV-1 vaccines. Vaccines have proven to be one of the most effective means of preventing serious infectious diseases. The contribution of vaccines toward markedly decreasing the incidence of many of the once-common childhood infectious diseases has been particularly notable (CDC, 1999). Thus, the public health goal is to develop an effective HIV-1 vaccine that will achieve a similar success in controlling the AIDS epidemic. However, the development of an HIV-1 vaccine has a unique and complex set of scientific, clinical, social, ethical, and economic challenges (Amara and Robinson, 2002; Esparza and Osmanov, 2003; Fast et al., 1995; Goldenthal et al.,1998; Klausner et al., 2003; Nathanson and Mathieson, 2000). Collaborative efforts in the development of an effective HIV-1 vaccine are ongoing among government agencies, academic investigators, and pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Even more organization on a global scale has been strongly encouraged (Klausner et al., 2003).