JOHANNESBURG, 25 August 2003—South Africa’s Medicines Control Council (MCC) has given approval for the start of a Phase I human trial of a preventive AIDS vaccine candidate under study by an international research team sponsored by the nonprofit International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI).

The vaccine candidate, named HIVA.MVA, was designed by the University of Nairobi in Kenya and University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Phase I human trials of the vaccine candidate already have been completed in Kenya and the UK and are underway in Uganda.

Scientists agree that a preventive vaccine is the best hope to end the spread of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. A preventive vaccine would be given to people who are uninfected with HIV, to stimulate their immune systems to prevent them from becoming infected or going on to develop AIDS.

http://www.mrc.ac.za/pressreleases/2003/26pres2003.htm