Scanning electron micrograph of HIV-1 budding (in green) from cultured lymphocyte WIKIMEDIA COMMONS, CDC, C. GOLDSMITH
A week from today (May 18) marks HIV Vaccine Awareness Day, an occasion designed to salute individuals on the front lines of efforts to develop a preventative vaccine against HIV. The drive to eradicate global AIDS is facing unprecedented challenges, with a report in The New York Times last year describing it as a war we are losing due to financial and technical roadblocks.
Yet tremendous progress is being made towards the development of an effective vaccine. In autumn 2009, a collaborative effort between the Ministry of Health in Thailand, the US Military, and the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease (NIAID) announced the first encouraging results from an efficacy trial -- 31 percent prevention of infection in a 16,402 person community-based trial ...
