Rodríguez Ana María, Turk Gabriela, Pascutti María Fernanda, Falivene Juliana, Gherardi María Magdalena
Centro Nacional de Referencia para el Sida, Departamento de Microbiología, Parasitología e Inmunología, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Medicina (B Aires). 2010;70(6):543-54.
It has been almost 30 years since the detection of the first HIV-1 cases and yet an effective and safe vaccine has not been developed. Although, advances in antiretroviral therapy (HAART) have produced a major impact on the pandemic, and even though HIV/aids remains a major concern for developing countries, where access to therapy is limited. The last report from UNAIDS notified 33 million people living with HIV/aids, worldwide, while in Argentina it is estimated that 120,000 persons have been infected. One of the challenges to address and ultimately overcome when developing a vaccine is the high variability of HIV-1. The M group, responsible for the pandemic, is divided into 10 subtypes and several sub-subtypes, in addition to the 48 circulating recombinant forms (CRF) and over one hundred unique recombinant forms (URF). The HIV epidemic in Argentina is as complex as in the rest of the world, characterized by the high prevalence of infections caused by subtype B and BF variants. Despite the wide range of publications focused on the immune response against HIV as well as to vaccine development, how to overcome variability on vaccine antigen selection is still unclear. Studies performed in our laboratory showed the impact of the immunogenicity of BF recombinant variants, both in humans and in animal models. These results are of great concern in vaccine development for our region.
