Administration Ends NIH’s HIV Vaccine Program

The New York Times (5/30, Mandavilli) reported the Trump Administration has terminated a $258 million program whose work was critical to the search for an HIV vaccine. A senior NIH official said, “The consortia for H.I.V./AIDS vaccine development and immunology was reviewed by N.I.H. leadership, which does not support it moving forward.” The program’s elimination is part of broad cuts to HIV-related initiatives by the Administration, which also shut down CDC’s HIV prevention division that “provided funds to states and territories for H.I.V. prevention and for detecting and responding to H.I.V. outbreaks.” Some experts reportedly fear that the “cuts will derail hard-won progress against H.I.V. over the past few decades.” Although the number of new HIV infections “had been declining steadily since 2010,” the World Health Organization reported 1.3 million new cases in 2023, including about 120,000 children.