Artist's rendering of an HIV virus.
Credit: iStockphoto
SCOTLAND: In 2007 a major HIV vaccine trial ground to a halt when the results showed that it actually increased rates of infection. Now researchers may have discovered why.
The team, led by Steven Patterson of Imperial College in London and the U.K. HIV Vaccines Consortium, have published a study in PNAS this week. It shows that before the vaccine had a chance to protect people, it may have prompted CD4 cells - the very cells that are vulnerable to HIV - to be in just the right place to encounter the virus.
Not so harmless vectors
HIV vaccines use harmless viruses called vectors to present parts of HIV to the immune system. This primes the immune system to recognise and destroy the real virus when infection occurs at a later date.
The vector used in the 2007 'STEP' trial was adenovirus 5, and intriguingly those vaccine recipients that had previously come into contact with this virus were the ones that were more likely to become infected with HIV.
Patterson said that, in his tests, CD4 cells from healthy volunteers, who had been previously infected with adenovirus 5, recognised the vaccine vector and then behaved as though they were trying to fight a new adenovirus 5 infection. The problem is that adenovirus 5 often causes gut infections, so the cells in Patterson's experiment started to make homing molecules that guide the CD4 cells to the gut surface.
For the mainly homosexual male participants of the STEP trial, an increased number of CD4 cells in their intestines - the entry portal for the virus - could have put them at increased risk of HIV infection.
Controversial findings
Patterson cautioned that at this stage his results are controversial. "But we would propose that the results of our study offer an explanation for the increased rate of infection [in the STEP trial]," he said.
Pat Fast, chief medical officer of the International Aids Vaccine Initiative in New York City, USA, describes the research as "important", but adds that we don't know how these results will translate to heterosexual HIV transmission and to injection drug populations. She says "one of the next steps is to see how this research relates to heterosexual sex in the real world."
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Heterosexual sex vs homosexual sex
The research was conducted in gay men and they provide an explanation why the vaccine trial failed due to activated gut-associated CD4 cells. This prompting Fast to say that "we don't know how these results will translate to heterosexual HIV transmission". The implication is that heterosexuals don't have anal sex which we know to be an untrue generalisation. What they really mean is that they don't know the effect on vaginal intercourse. Isn't this just phobia of talking about anal sex and therefore thinly veiled homophobia? Why is Cosmos, the 'science of everything', limited in its discussion of our basic modes of sex and reproduction quarter of a century into the epidemic?
Are we being kept in the dark?
Marvin Antlemen patented tetrasilver tetroxide for treatment of HIV back in the 90s. 40ppm by weight of blood was found to inactivate a host of virals including HIV.
Dr Kaali patented a blood cleaning device in 93 which pulses blood with AC current of 12 volts at around 300mA which damages HIV.
Searching the US Trademarks and Patents site is not easy but if anyone wants the pat. nos. I have them somewhere.
HIV is a fairly benign retro-virus anyway so what's all the fuss? A GP I know says lots of people carry anti-bodies to it but she doesn't tell them in case they freak out. Only people with rooted immune systems end up having problems.
JPAK.
g3design@gotalk.net.au