Drug companies lack incentive to create a vaccine, official says

He said the government will eventually create a vaccine.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- In an unusually candid admission, the federal chief of AIDS research says he believes drug companies don't have an incentive to create a vaccine for the HIV and are likely to wait to profit from it after the government develops one.
And that means the government has had to spend more time focusing on the processes that drug companies ordinarily follow in developing new medicines and bringing them to market.
"We had to spend some time and energy paying attention to those aspects of development because the private side isn't picking it up," Dr. Edmund Tramont testified in a deposition in a recent employment lawsuit obtained by The Associated Press.
Tramont is head of the AIDS research division of the National Institutes of Health, and he predicted in his testimony that the government will eventually create a vaccine. He testified in July in the whistleblower case of Dr. Jonathan Fishbein.
"If we look at the vaccine, HIV vaccine, we're going to have an HIV vaccine. It's not going to be made by a company," Tramont said. "They're dropping out like flies because there's no real incentive for them to do it. We have to do it."
"They will eventually -- if it works, they won't have to make that big investment. And they can make it and sell it and make a profit," he said.
Response
An official of the group representing the country's major drug companies took sharp exception to Tramont's comments.
"That is simply not true. America's pharmaceutical research companies are firmly committed to HIV/AIDS vaccine research and development with 15 potential vaccines in development today," said Ken Johnson, senior vice president of PhRMA, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America.
"Vaccine research is crucial to controlling the AIDS pandemic, and our companies are well aware of the need to succeed in this vital area of science," Johnson said.
In an e-mail response for comment, Tramont said the HIV vaccine mirrors the history of other vaccines. "It is not just a HIV vaccine -- it's all vaccines -- that is why there was/is a shortage of flu vaccines," Tramont wrote.
The quest for an AIDS vaccine has been one of science's biggest disappointments despite billions of dollars and years of research. Part of the dilemma is that such a vaccine must work through the very immune system that AIDS compromises.
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