Top researcher says vaccine could arrive in 5 years.(AIDS virus)

2002 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com & NewsRx.net) -- After years of frustrating near-breakthroughs, a vaccine could be developed within 5 years that would provide complete protection against the AIDS virus, one of the world's leading AIDS researchers said September 17, 2002.

"You always have to worry about being confident with this beast," said Dr. Robert Gallo of the University of Maryland, codiscoverer of the AIDS virus. "But we're excited. We have a shot."

Gallo said the optimism over earlier beliefs that the spread of the virus was leveling off, along with the effectiveness of the triple-drug therapy, has led to a complacency among many that is only worsening the epidemic.

AIDS has become the world's worst epidemic, infecting 40 million people worldwide, more than half of them in Africa, Gallo said.

In the developing world as a whole, less than 1% of people infected with the AIDS virus are receiving drug treatment, according to a recent World Health Organization report.

"The focus now is on the Africa crisis, but we're going to hear about more crises soon," said Gallo, who spoke at Florida Atlantic University before the dedication of a new biomedical science center.

He said the fastest rise in new cases is occurring in Russia, China and India and that he expects another epidemic in Europe and possibly the United States.