Subject: Vaccine Research For AIDS Advances Over Two Obstacles
Date: Published: 4/16/85 98 lines
Source:  Wall Street Journal.  Copyright Dow Jones Inc. 

   Vaccine Research
   For AIDS Advances
   Over Two Obstacles
    ---
   Tests of Possible Vaccine
   Start on Resus Monkeys
   At U. S. Cancer Institute
    ---
   By Marilyn Chase
   Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

   ATLANTA -- The hunt for a vaccine against acquired immune
deficiency syndrome gained ground with reports that
scientists may have cleared two obstacles hindering research
on an effective vaccine.
   As a result of the two developments, tests of a possible
vaccine against AIDS have begun at the National Cancer
Institute in Bethesda, Md.
   Scientists at the Harvard University School of Public
Health have identified a part of the AIDS virus that seems to
resist mutation, Myron Essex, a Harvard researcher, told
scientists yesterday at an international conference on the
often-fatal disease.
   Previously it was feared that the virus that causes AIDS
was a "moving target" -- that it mutated so much that a
single vaccine couldn't prevent all strains.  But a newly
identified protein, or piece of the virus coat, apparently
doesn't change, and so is thought to be useful in developing
a standard vaccine, Mr. Essex said.
   Another hurdle to testing such a vaccine has been the
difficulty in finding an animal that develops the disease and
its symptoms like humans do.
   Mr. Essex said he and colleagues at the New England
Regional Primate Center have found that a form of AIDS in
monkeys may be caused by a virus akin to the one that causes
the disease in people.  He said that rhesus monkeys suffering
from simian AIDS harbor a virus very similar to HTLV-III, the
virus believed to cause human AIDS. 
   Although it's not known whether an effective vaccine for
AIDS in humans will ever be found, the close parallel between
the human and monkey diseases reported by Mr. Essex may help
testing of possible human vaccines or treatments.
   "We have in (the rhesus monkey) a good model for vaccine
testing," Mr. Essex said.  He said that a second monkey, the
African green monkey, which carries the simian AIDS virus but
doesn't contract the disease, may provide scientists with a
model of how protection against the disease evolves.
   "In my opinion, that animal model is our best hope," for
beginning tests that could lead to a human vaccine, said
William Haseltine, another Harvard scientist.  Dr. Haseltine
said the rhesus monkey will probably supplant the chimpanzee
as an experimental animal because chimps infected with AIDS
virus develop a mild set of symptoms like swollen glands, but
don't come down with more serious symptoms.  Rhesus monkeys,
by contrast, appear to contract "a true immunosupressive
disease," he said.
   Mr. Essex said his findings would be published soon in the
journal Science.
   Scientists at the National Cancer Institute already have
put some of the new findings to an early test, researchers
said.
   Last week, scientists at the institute began tests of a
vaccine made from the glycoprotein, or virus coat, that Mr. 
Essex identified.
   "It's gone into rhesus monkeys about a week ago," said a
university scientist who is participating in the experiment.
"We now have to see whether it raises an antibody response,
and whether those antibodies protect against a challenge by
the virus."
   Peter Fischinger, acting director of the National Cancer
Institute, couldn't be reached for comment.
   The AIDS conference, which has drawn doctors and research
scientists from around the world, was convened by the Centers
for Disease Control.
   James W. Curran, head of the centers' AIDS program, gave
new numbers on the epidemic and a new forecast of its growth.
The 9,600 cases documented in the U. S. will double in the
next year to between 18,000 and 19,000 cases, he said.
   The actual spread of infection is vastly greater.  "My own
guess is that between 500,000 and one million Americans have
been infected with the disease," Dr. Curran said.  Although
only a small percentage of those infected will develop AIDS,
he said, the infection is chronic.
   "Persistent, even lifelong infection may be expected," Dr. 
Curran said.  A silent carrier may spread the disease sexually
or by donating infected blood to a blood bank.  An infected
mother may pass the disease to her unborn child, or to an
infant through her milk, he added.

(This article is made available here by Dow Jones Co. for the 
personal and non-commercial use of callers to this bbs, in the 
hope that it will be of some help to those who are suffering 
from the disease and others who are seeking to help them.)