Plans for a large human trial of a vaccine against the AIDS virus in the United States were canceled Thursday because federal health officials said the vaccine was unlikely to prove effective and might increase the risk of HIV infection among volunteers.
The decision is another major setback in scientific efforts to develop an HIV vaccine, which health officials contend would be their best weapon to control the AIDS pandemic. A number of other vaccines are in various stages of testing among people in many countries.
But after more than a quarter of a century of trying make an effective HIV vaccine, scientists say that the prospect of marketing the first such prevention is years off, if one is ever developed.
After a meeting sponsored by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases last March, many AIDS experts said that researchers must go back to the drawing boards before they could develop an effective HIV vaccine.
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