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First Dar resident gets HIV/AIDS vaccine
2007-02-21 09:16:47
By Pascal Shao
The first trial vaccination against HIV/AIDS in Dar es Salaam was given to a policeman at the Muhimbili National Hospital (MNH) yesterday.
The man is Ally Said (27) and was given the vaccination, known as DNA-MVA Prime Boost, in the morning.
He later told journalists that he was not forced by anybody to go for the vaccination, adding that he summoned extra boldness before making the decision.
`I feel a very proud man to go down in history as the first person in Dar es Salaam to be vaccinated under the programme. I am especially proud because I know that if the programme is successful, many Tanzanians will benefit,` Said pointed out.
The vaccine will be given to 60 Dar es Salaam-based police officers, 15 of them women.
The programme`s director, Dr. Mohamed Bakari, said it will be carried out for six month as an HIV vaccine immunogenicity study under the Tanswed HIV programme.
The director said the vaccination was the strategy meant to cover the entire world `to ensure that vaccines against the deadly disease are ultimately made available to all people`.
`Our target is to eradicate the HIV/AIDS scourge in the future. The aim of the vaccine is to test its ability in the production of immunity-enhancing catalysts in human beings and not against the scourge,` explained Dr. Bakari.
He said other aims were to establish the side-effects of the vaccination and help Tanzania take a meaningful and beneficial part in the campaign just as it did with respect to chicken pox.
`People to be vaccinated must have an informed consent, should be healthy enough and should be at the minimum chances of being infected with HIV/AIDS,` according to Dr. Bakari.
He said the vaccination had already been tried in Botswana, Kenya, Malawi, Botswana, South Africa, Uganda, Zambia and Tanzania’s Mbeya Region.
The vaccine was manufactured in Sweden and United States of America by taking into special consideration the Tanzanian environment and the types of HIV found in the country.
The vaccine is administered by specialists from the Muhimbili University College of Health Sciences, MNH and several other Tanzanian and foreign institutions.
It is funded by the Government of Tanzania, the European Union and the Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA/SAREC).
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