AEGiS-AP: HeaIth of Australians with HIV spurring hope for AIDS vaccine: DISEASE: A donor and six people infected by his blood have remained healthy for more than a decade.

Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1995. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.

HeaIth of Australians with HIV spurring hope for AIDS vaccine: DISEASE: A donor and six people infected by his blood have remained healthy for more than a decade.

The Associated Press - Nov 10, 1995
Lauran Neergaard

WASHINGTON--An Australian with the AIDS virus who unknowingly infected that country's blood supply 14 years ago has given scientists stronger evidence that a live AIDS vaccine might work.

The blood donor and six people infected by his plasma have remained healthy longer than a decade and even have normal immune systems because they have a genetically weak strain of the virus, Australian scientists report in Friday's edition of the journal Science.

Coincidentally, the human immunodeficiency virus infecting the Australians is almost identical to a manmade strain U.S. researchers have developed as a possible vaccine for acquired immune deficiency syndrome - one many scientists fear could be deadly even though weakened. Until now, only one other person in the world had been found living with weak HIV.

"The Australians provide additional information that these kinds of strains can be safe over the long run," said Dr. Ronald Desrosiers of the New England Primate Research Center. He developed the potential vaccine.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, chief of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said, "This extraordinary experiment of nature ... makes you think again about the feasibility of a live attennated vaceine.

"But it doesn't necessarily take us any closer to having an attenuated live vaccine," he warned. "These people have been followed for 10 years.... You worry about what happens in 15 to 20 years."

More immediately, the findings help explain why some people maintain healthy immune systems beyond the 10 years it typically takes HIV to turn deadly, wrote study author Nicholas Deacon of Australia's Macfarlane Burnet Centre for Medical Research.

The Australians' HIV is missing parts of a gene called nef. Scientists believe nef spurs HIV to reproduce frantically until it overwhelms patients' immune systems--and if nef doesn't work right, immune cells can control HIV just as they fight most viruses.

"These data show that survival after HIV infection can be determined by the HIV genome," Deacon concluded.

But the findings do not affect most people living with HIV, Desrosiers cautioned. Only a very, very small percentage of the 17 million people infected worldwide stay healthy beyond a decade.

Killed HIV virus isn't strong enough to use as an AIDS vaccine, and scientists fear a shot containing live but weakened virus--the kind used for most diseases--could sicken people instead of preventing AIDS.

Three years ago, Desrosiers removed the entire nef gene from the monkey version of HIV to create a powerful vaccine that protected adult monkeys. But development slowed when other scientists discovered the shot infected baby monkeys.

In January, Desrosiers and Dr. John Sullivan of the University of Massachusetts discovered nef pieces missing in a 44-year-old American whose immune system was healthy after 12 years of HIV infection.

One case did little to impress skeptics. Now there's stronger evidence.

Seven Australians caught HIV between 101 and 14 years ago from blood donated by an eighth person. One already had severe lupus and died of that disease in 1987. But the others have normal immune systems, no HIV symptoms and little virus in their blood, Deacon reported.

The HIV infecting the Australians is missing different portions of the nef gene than the American lacked, prompting Sullivan to urge that other long-term HIV survivors be tested.

"Our hope is that by continuing to identify these kinds of individuals, society's going to say, 'Yes, we really need a vaccine,'" Sullivan said.

Copyright 1995/The Associated Press. Reproduced with permission. Reproduction of this article (other than one copy for personal reference) must be cleared through the Permissions Desk, The Associated Press, 50 Rockefeller Plaza, New York, NY 10020.

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