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AIDS Vaccines Worse Than Useless?

press-release

 

The Institute of Science in Society

Science Society Sustainability

http://www.i-sis.org.uk

 

General Enquiries sam

Website/Mailing List press-release

ISIS Director m.w.ho

===================================================

 

Health & the Fluid Genome

In her new book, Living with the Fluid Genome

(http://www.i-sis.org.uk/fluidGenome.php), Mae-Wan Ho writes,

 

" The responsiveness of genes and genomes to the environment makes clear that the

only way to keep genes and genomes constant and healthy is to have a balanced

ecology... On the other hand, it is definitely futile to think that we can go on

ruining our ecosystem and stay healthy so long as we have ‘good’ genes... Genes,

unlike diamonds, are not forever. "

 

This miniseries offers new insights into how major chronic diseases arise from

the inability to take the fluid genome seriously, and how strategies to combat

the diseases are similarly misguided and dangerous.

 

AIDS Vaccines Worse Than Useless?

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The US administration is offering AIDS-ravaged nations support for fighting AIDS

tied to the purchase of GM products. The main anti-AIDS strategy is a class of

vaccines that carries its own risks. Prominent AIDS researchers have called

repeatedly for a moratorium as evidence of hazards accumulates. Dr. Mae-Wan Ho

reports.

 

The complete document with references, is available in the ISIS members site

(http://www.i-sis.org.uk/full/AVWTUFull.php). Full details here

(http://www.i-sis.org.uk/membership.php)

 

George Bush has taken Europe to the World Trade Organisation over Europe’s de

facto moratorium on GM imports. In the week of the G8 summit in Evian, France,

Bush blasted Europe for perpetuating starvation in Africa by blocking US food

aid with anti-GM policies, and announced his pledge of $15bn to combat AIDS

globally, especially in Africa.

 

The UN Population Division reported earlier this year that by 2050, the

population of the hardest hit nations will have risen by 400 million less than

previously estimated because of AIDS. " This estimate could be the first sign

that HIV-1 will cause extinction of human beings in this millennium unless an

effective AIDS vaccine is developed, " said a commentary by Veljko Veljkovic and

colleagues in the Lancet, published in February.

 

The only AIDS vaccine to have progressed past phase 3 trial, made by VaxGen,

took 5 years and involved 5108 gay men and 309 women. Unfortunately, it proved

ineffective, and may even be harmful.

 

In the 3003 white and Hispanic volunteers who received VaxGen’s vaccine, a

higher proportion suffered breakthrough infections than in the 1508 controls: 6%

vs 5%. Although the difference is not significant, it could indicate a dangerous

trend. But the company is not releasing further details on the trial results.

 

A few days after Bush announced the AIDS package, US Congress was denounced for

tying support for anti-AIDS research programmes in 50 countries to their

acceptance of GM products. This accusation came from Julio Sanchez,

representative of Mesoamerican Trade. Introducing GM food to hungry,

malnourished nations ravaged by AIDS is bad enough in terms of health risks, but

AIDS research programmes are heavily concentrated towards vaccine development

with a strategy that introduces its own health hazards, as is becoming

increasingly clear. During the past decade, a number of AIDS researchers, among

whom Veljkovic and his team in Yugoslavia, have been studying the properties of

the human immune deficiency virus, HIV-1, especially its envelop glycoprotein,

gp120, which features in most of the AIDS candidate vaccines.

 

The gp120 protein is strongly immunogenic, which is why it is widely used in

vaccines, in the hope that the body will produce antibodies against the protein

and hence protect against the virus. But there have been many worrying signs

that this may have just the opposite effect.

 

For although the body mounts a strong immune reaction against the protein, and

produces antibodies against it, those antibodies fail to protect against the

virus. One main reason is that the virus is very mutable, and can readily mutate

to escape immune detection. In addition, the immune reaction mounted against the

original gp120 undermines the effectiveness of the immune system by

over-stimulating it, so that it is less effective to cope with new infections.

 

A recombinant gp120 vaccine tested in HIV-negative individuals in phaseI/II

trails, was not effective in protecting against the disease. Not only that,

participants in the trials had significant levels of circulating antibodies

against the vaccine before they became infected, and came down with AIDS

disease.

 

The vaccine could also be dangerous. A vaccine based on the gp120 from the

strain SF2, actually suppressed the production of antibodies that could

neutralise the later infecting virus, while boosting the production of useless

antibodies that were specific for the vaccine strain, SF2. In other words, gp120

acts as a molecular decoy to disarm the body’s antiviral response, leaving it

more vulnerable, and increasing the likelihood of rapid disease progression in

those vaccinated that later became infected. This phenomenon is called

" deceptive imprinting " of the immune system.

 

Were those effects predictable in advance of the clinical trials? Veljkovic and

his colleagues answer a definite yes.

 

First of all, the part of the gp120 molecule that plays the dominant role in

provoking an immune response is the V3 loop. The V3 loop and flanking regions

are similar in base sequence and structure to the antigen-binding region of the

human immunoglobulin (Ig) (antibody protein). And it has been proposed since the

early 1990s that this immunoglobulin-like domain in gp120 may interfere with the

immune regulatory network. This is strongly supported by later observations that

the anti-V3 and anti-Ig antibodies of healthy individuals are similar in

structure, and that antibodies reacting to V3 are present in sera that are

HIV-negative.

 

In 1999, Howard Urnovitz and colleagues identified a mysterious case of AIDS in

a French woman with no risk factors. Analysis of the isolated HIV viral envelope

showed that it had homology to sequences found on at least 14 different human

chromosomes. This opened a whole new can of worms. Was this rare strain of HIV-1

the result of genetic recombination (reshuffling) in the human genome, similar

to that found in veterans suffering from Gulf War syndrome (see " Dynamic

genomics " , this series http://www.i-sis.org.uk/DynamicGenomics.php)? Antibodies

to human endogenous retroviruses were found in the urine of patients with

clinical AIDS. Thus, vaccinating against HIV-1 may be tentamount to vaccinating

people against their own genes (see " Endogenous retroviruses & chronic disease " ,

this series http://www.i-sis.org.uk/ERCD.php). Does that mean genetic

reshuffling and retroviral elements in the human genome may have a key role to

play in AIDS disease, as in Gulf War Syndrome and other

chronic disease?

 

Another piece of evidence implicating genetic recombination is that the V3 loop

and its flanking regions are located between recombination signals similar to

those found in human immunoglobulins, and also similar to the Chi recombination

hotpots found in many viruses and bacteria. Consequently, the immunologically

dominant region of gp120 may be involved in recombining with human

immunoglobulin genes resulting in autoimmune responses, and may also recombine

with co-infecting viruses and bacteria to generate new pathogens. Evidence of

such recombination has subsequently been found in the sera of AIDS patients.

 

Many other observations have linked gp120 with auto-antibodies that react

against the body’s own cells and enhance the infectivity of HIV-1, and those

researchers have also issued warnings against AIDS vaccines.

 

In fact, warnings against AIDS vaccines go back to Albert Sabin, one of the most

prominent viral vaccine developers of the 20th century. " The available data

provide no basis for testing any HIV vaccine in human beings either before or

after infection, " Sabin stated.

 

The current issue of Vaccine carries an article evaluating the long-term safety

of a range of AIDS vaccines involving 3189 HIV uninfected, healthy volunteers

who were enrolled into 51 NIAID (NIH) - sponsored Phase I and II clinical

trials. It concluded that there were no adverse effects. Veljkovic remarks,

" This conclusion was based on analysis of many important parameters

….Unfortunately, the key information - comparison of the health status between

breakthrough infected vaccinated volunteers and control subjects who

participated in these trials - was not reported, just as it was not reported by

VaxGen in the results of their Phase III clinical trial. "

 

Unless this information is reported, says Veljkovic, the companies and

institutions that organized these clinical trials are in danger of committing a

scientific and ethical misconduct.

 

It is pertinent to point out that transgenic DNA in GM food and feed also carry

recombination hotspots, such as the ones associated with the CaMV 35S promoter

and the left and right borders of the Agrobacterium T-DNA used as vector to

introduce transgenic DNA into the plant genome. These recombination hotspots

enhance horizontal gene transfer and recombination. Furthermore, as Veljkovic

said, the recombination hotspots in transgenic DNA may interact with the

recombination signals flanking the V3 loop of the gp120 gene in AIDS vaccines to

generate yet more exotic viruses.

 

Veljkovic and his colleagues have repeated their call for an immediate

moratorium on the current clinical trials of HIV-1 gp120/160 vaccines.

 

The complete document with references, is available in the ISIS members site

(http://www.i-sis.org.uk/full/AVWTUFull.php). Full details here

(http://www.i-sis.org.uk/membership.php)

 

===================================================

This article can be found on the I-SIS website at http://www.i-sis.org.uk/

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General Enquiries sam

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ISIS Director m.w.ho

 

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