Human trial with AIDS vaccine to
commence in Finland

December 3 2001, Helsingin Sanomat, Business & Finance

Fit Biotech, a Tampere-based biotechnology company, announced on Friday that it will begin a human trial with its AIDS vaccine. The vaccine is a new product that has been developed by the Finnish company, and the trial is due to begin within the next two months.

Fit Biotech President and CEO Pekka Sillanaukee revealed that some twenty HIV-positive volunteers will participate in the trial. The trial is a phase I clinical trial, and the drug will not reach the market until the completion of three successful phases of testing, and after authorities approve the product. Sillanaukee estimates that if the process is successful, a sales license for the vaccine would be granted in 2007-2011. Product development normally takes 15-20 years. In the first phase, the aim is to determine the safety of the vaccine, as well as any possible side-effects.

Compared with more conventional vaccines, the novelty of the Fit Biotech product is that it is based on so-called genetic immunisation. According to Sillanaukee, the drug is a third-generation HIV medicine that imitates a live virus with the help of gene technology. This procedure removes the risk of a healthy individual being infected by the real virus. The cells of the vaccine recipient begin to produce antigens because of the DNA plasmid that the vaccine contains. Sillanaukee reported that the objective of the company is to produce a vaccine that will be readily available at a low cost to third world countries.

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