£16 m project launched for HIV vaccine

The European AIDS Vaccine Initiative 2020 (EAVI2020) has launched with a £16 million initiative to accelerate the search a HIV vaccine

The EAVI2020 is financed by the European Commission and brings together HIV researchers from Europe, Australia, Canada and the USA to develop protective and therapeutic HIV vaccines.

According to the World Health Organisation around 35 million people were living with HIV at the end of 2013 with two million people newly infected every year.

However, scientists have isolated antibodies that are able to block HIV infection in preclinical models and there have been new developments in using synthetic biology to design better HIV vaccines.

Robin Shattock, coordinator of EAVI2020, said: “Creating an effective vaccine against HIV represents one of the greatest biological challenges of a generation.

“This project creates an unique opportunity for us to build on the enormous scientific progress gleaned over the last few years, providing an unprecedented insight into the nature of protective antibodies and anti-viral cellular response that will be needed for an effective vaccine.

“But it is impossible for one group or institution to create an HIV vaccine on its own. This new project should enable us to move much more quickly.”

BioNTech RNA Pharmaceuticals, a member of the EAVI2020 consortium, is developing candidate vaccines that it said could be taken through to human trials within five years.

Ugur Sahin, founder and CEO of BioNTech, said: “We are delighted to be part of this world-class consortium and to collaborate with leading experts from around the globe in the field of anti-infective vaccine development.

“This project has great potential and will allow us to develop a completely new class of highly-potent, self-amplifying RNA vaccines for the effective prevention and treatment of HIV infection.”