A meeting was organized by the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Japanese National Institute of Infectious Diseases (NIID) with the following objectives: (i) to discuss public health and economic rationale to accelerate the development and evaluation of HIV vaccines suitable for use in Asia; (ii) to review ongoing preclinical HIV vaccine research in Asia; (iii) to review the Asian experience in conducting clinical trials of HIV candidate vaccines; (iv) to explore possibilities for international collaboration between countries in the region and with other countries and institutions; and (v) to discuss issues related to availability of future effective HIV vaccines. The meeting was attended by participants from Australia, China, France, Germany, India, Japan, Malaysia, Myanmar, South Korea, Thailand, United Kingdom, and the United States of America. The HIV epidemic in Asia is rapidly spreading and has already resulted in a total of 7 million HIV infections in the region. The epidemic already has a significant public health and economic impact, which may be worse in the future, unless effective intervention programmes are successfully implemented. A safe, effective, and affordable vaccine should be considered as the best hope for a long-term solution to the HIV epidemic in Asia. Asian scientists and institutions have established a number of international collaborations to isolate and characterize prevalent HIV-1 strains (mostly belonging to subtypes C and E) and are developing candidate vaccines based on these subtypes. In the region, phase I/II clinical trials of preventative HIV candidate vaccines have been conducted in Australia, China and Thailand. Since 1993, a comprehensive National AIDS Vaccine Plan has allowed Thailand to conduct phase I/II trials of six different preventative or therapeutic candidate vaccines, and the first phase III preventative efficacy trial has been approved. The meeting identified both the needs and the opportunities to intensify international collaboration to accelerate the development of HIV vaccines in Asia.
Matched MeSH terms: AIDS Vaccines/economics; AIDS Vaccines/immunology*
High vaccination rates are integral to reducing infection and severity rates of COVID-19 infections within a community. We examine the role of social expectations in COVID-19 vaccination take-ups and its interaction with potential government actions in Malaysia. We find that individuals' expectations of others in their social groups towards vaccination predicts those individuals' vaccination registrations. Using a vignette experiment, we examine the extent of normative expectations in normalizing pro-vaccination behavior beyond an individual's reference group. We find that unless moderated by a high level of public trust, individuals prefer punitive policies as a way to increase vaccination rates in their communities.
Matched MeSH terms: AIDS Vaccines*; SAIDS Vaccines*
HIV-1 vaccine functioning relies on successful induction of broadly neutralizing antibodies (bNAbs). CXCR3- circulatory T-follicular helper (cTfh) cells are necessary for inducing B-cells for generating bNAbs. Recent studies have suggested that CXCR3+ Tfh cells might also influence bNAb production. Plasma samples from 34 ART-Naïve HIV-1 infected individuals [long-term nonprogressors (LTNP)-19; Progressors-13] were tested against a heterologous virus panel (n = 11) from subtypes A, B, C, G, AC, BC and AE. Frequencies of CXCR3+ and CXCR3- cTfh-like cells in peripheral circulation were studied using flow cytometry. LTNP showed significantly lower CXCR3+ and higher CXCR3- cTfh-like cell frequencies, while neutralization breadth was observed to be broader in progressors. A positive correlation was observed between bNAb breadth and potency with CXCR3+PD-1+ cTfh-like cells in LTNP. Based on neutralization breadth, 9 HIV-1 infected individuals were classified as 'top neutralizers' and 23 as 'low neutralizers' and they did not show any correlations with CXCR3+ and CXCR3- cTfh-like cells. These preliminary data suggest that CXCR3+ similar to CXCR3- might possess significant functional properties for driving B-cells to produce bNAbs. Hence, an HIV vaccine which is capable of optimal induction of CXCR3+ cTfh cells at germinal centers might confer superior protection against HIV.