Seanad debates
Wednesday, 26 November 2003
Overseas Development Aid: Motion.
I am glad the Minister of State is supporting the microbicides initiative, particularly in view of the fact that the latest vaccine trials have failed and the next ones will not be held until 2007. This is most disappointing. I am not an expert on vaccinations but because the HIV virus can mutate so easily, I believed it would be particularly difficult to produce a vaccine for it. They tried to produce the vaccine with the DNA core but the latest results are disappointing. Some of my colleagues who work in the field of HIV infection are not enthusiastic about microbicides but that might just be in Europe. Things are different in Africa. I have little experience of meeting people in this field in Asia, eastern Europe or Russia.
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