PASADENA, Calif. — The eerie music in the movie theater swells; the roller coaster crests and begins its descent; something goes bump in the night. Suddenly, you’re scared: your heart thumps, your stomach clenches, your throat tightens, your muscle…
With over 40 million people worldwide currently living with HIV/AIDS and millions more becoming infected each year, a group of scientists is calling for a coordinated global HIV vaccine enterprise to speed up the development and testing of promising candidates. In an article in the June 27 issue of Science, the authors emphasize the urgent need for an HIV vaccine, and outline a plan to accelerate research. Without a vaccine, if current trends continue, 45 million new people will become infected by 2010 and 70 million people will die by 2020, the World Health Organization and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS predict.
