Great news for Virax to finally receive approval to undertake...

Great news for Virax to finally receive approval to undertake the trial of their HIV vaccine.

Virax Shares Jump on Plans for BHP-Funded HIV Study (Update1)
By Simeon Bennett
Aug. 8 (Bloomberg) -- Virax Holdings Ltd. jumped the most in 10 years in Australian trading after regulators in South Africa said its HIV treatment can be studied in a human trial co-funded by BHP Billiton Ltd. and Rio Tinto Group.
Virax shares surged as much as 2.4 Australian cents, or 60 percent, to 6.4 cents, the biggest intra-day gain since November 1998. They advanced 1 cent to 5 cents at 1:14 p.m. Sydney time. Tests on more than 100 patients in four South African provinces will start this year, Chief Executive Officer Larry Ward said in a telephone interview from Melbourne today.
South Africa, the world's biggest precious metals producer, has more HIV patients than any other country. Virax's treatment, known as VIR201, uses parts of the HIV virus to trigger the body's immune system to better find and destroy infected cells. The so-called therapeutic vaccine may enable HIV sufferers to stop taking antiviral medicines for a year or more, Ward said.
``It makes sense that people where HIV is a real problem are exposed to cutting-edge drugs,'' Ward said.
BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto, the world's largest miners, are among a dozen companies funding the $6 million trial, Melbourne- based Virax said in a statement today.
``A lot of these companies put a lot of money into the community where they have their mines,'' Ward said.
The treatment reduced the levels of HIV about 10-fold in an earlier trial involving 25 patients in Australia, he said. Improvements to the manufacturing process and higher dosing may yield a better result in the South African study, he said.
``The vaccine is not designed as a cure, but as a way of allowing the immune system to keep the HIV at bay for a longer period of time,'' said Stephen Kent, a professor of microbiology and immunology at the University of Melbourne who studied the drug in animals about a decade ago.
Avoiding the use of anti-retroviral drugs would save costs, spare patients the side effects that accompany the treatments and help prevent drug resistance that develops when people don't comply with doctors' orders for taking them, Kent said in a telephone interview today.
To contact the reporter on this story: Simeon Bennett in Singapore at [email protected]
Last Updated: August 8, 2008 00:02 EDT

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