A "Patch" For HIV in 3-5 Years?

[Reuters] A therapeutic vaccine delivered through the skin could help restore HIV-specific immune response in HIV-infected patients, based on the results of a primate study.

The DermaVir patch produced simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV)-specific CD4 and CD8 cell responses in SIV-naive rhesus macaques, Dr. Julianna Lisziewicz of the Research Institute for Genetic and Human Therapy in Washington, and her colleagues report in the January issue of the Journal of Investigative Dermatology.

Another study by the team, published this month in the journal AIDS, shows the vaccine can also produce a response in SIV-infected macaques, including immunocompromised animals, Dr. Lisziewicz told Reuters Health. Tests of the DermaVir patch are underway in humans in Europe, and are set to launch in the US soon, she added.

The vaccine consists of a plasmid DNA expressing every HIV protein, except for integrase, complexed with glucose. The patch is applied to the skin after exfoliation. Langerhans cells in the epidermis, which process antigens on the skin and deliver them to draining lymph nodes, "see" the vaccine particles as HIV, and eventually differentiate into dendritic cells that present the HIV antigens to T cells, Dr. Lisziewicz explained.

The vaccine, "a very new composition," is an alternative to the much more cumbersome ex vivo manipulation of dendritic cells, she noted. While antiretroviral drugs can control HIV infection, Dr. Lisziewicz noted, they cannot restore HIV-specific immune response, but DermaVir has the potential to do so.

"We believe it would be a very useful new kind of treatment which would be added to the antiretroviral therapy," she said. The patch is worn for 3 hours, Dr. Lisziewicz said. She and her colleagues foresee that it would not be used just once or twice, but perhaps every few months or every couple of years.