Why is it more difficult to develop a vaccine against HIV/AIDS than a COVID-19-based vaccine?
Smallpox is gone from the earth following an extremely successful, world-wide vaccination campaign. Poliomyelitis that is paralytic is not a concern within the U.S. because of development and the use of highly effective vaccines against poliovirus. In the present thousands of people have been spared as a result of the rapid development of treatments for COVID-19. Yet, it’s taken 37 years to get there since HIV was first identified as the main cause of AIDS and there is no vaccine to treat it. This article will highlight the obstacles to developing an effective HIV/AIDS vaccine.
I am an assistant instructor of pathology in the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. My lab is responsible for discovering the monkey-borne virus SIV, also known as the simian immune deficiency virus. SIV is the closest to the monkey-related virus which is responsible for AIDS in humans. HIV or HIV, or human immunodeficiency. My research has made a significant contribution to understanding the mechanisms that HIV is a cause of disease as well as to the development of vaccines.
HIV vaccination efforts have been unsuccessful.
Vaccines have been the most effective tool against diseases that are that are of medical significance. As the unpredicted disease AIDS emerged in the early 1980s , and the virus responsible for it was identified in 1983 and 1984 there was no reason not that the researchers could develop a vaccine to combat it.
At a renowned public event in the year 1984 that announced HIV as the primary cause of AIDS at the time, U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Margaret Heckler stated that the vaccine would be made within the next two years. It’s now 37 years later and there’s no vaccine. The speed at which COVID-19’s vaccine production and distribution puts the absence for the HIV vaccine in the midst of a stark contrast. The issue is not the any failure on the part of government. The problem is not the lack of money. The problem lies with that of the HIV virus in itself. Particularly, this is due to the amazing HIV strain diversity and immune strategies used by the virus.
Therefore, should we researches abandon our pursuits? We shouldn’t. One strategy being explored by researchers with animal models in two labs is using herpesviruses as vectors to release AIDS viral proteins. Herpes virus is part of those belonging to the “persistent” group of. When you contract herpesvirus the person is infected for the rest of your life. Immune responses do not last only as a memory, but are active in a continuous manner. The effectiveness of this method however, will be dependent on finding out how to trigger the range of immune responses that provide protection against the variety of HIV sequences that circulate in the human population.
Another strategy is to target the protection of immunity from another perspective. While the majority of HIV-infected patients produce antibodies with limited, specific neutralizing activities for their strains however, a few rare individuals create antibodies that have potent neutralizing properties against a variety of HIV isolates. These antibodies are extremely rare and very rare, yet we have them in our arsenal.
Additionally, researchers have discovered a method to increase the concentrations of this antibody throughout all time with just one administration. For life! This is a result of an infectious vector, which is a vector known as the adeno-associated virus. If the virus is administered to muscles, the cells of muscle become factories that produce continuously powerful widely neutralizing antigens. Researchers have recently observed the continuous production of about six and a half years in monkeys..
