[Letter to Floyd Bloom from R. Scott Hitt]

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PRESIDENTIAL
ADVISORY
COUNCIL ON
HIV/AIDS
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736 Jackson Place, N.W.
Washington, DC 20503

August26, 1998 ) t'
Floyd Bloom, M.D. ( j
Editor, Science Magazine
American Association for the
Advancement of Science
1200 New York Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C.
Dear Dr. Bloom:
As members of the Presidential Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS
(PACHA) we would like to clarify our position and recommendations made to
President Clinton regarding the development of a vaccine against HIV. It is clear
from the letter published in Science on May 8, 1998 by Agosto, et al, that the
authors had either not read or not understood the recommendations which we
made.
First, under no circumstance did PACHA recommend that the
"...responsibility for the development of an HIV vaccine should be removed from
the NIH and transferred to other federal agencies." What we did recommend, in
fact, was that the NIH should continue its major responsibility in terms of
defining the scientific basis for further vaccine development. We also
recommended, however, that other federal agencies with known experience and
expertise in vaccine development be brought onto the team. With the daunting
tasks ahead, it would seem obvious that one agency alone, no matter how
accomplished, would be less than optimal. Further, since multiple existing
agencies-such as the CDC, DOD, and others-have already had years of
experience in various aspects of vaccine generation and testing, it appeared clear
to us that all existing expertise should be employed, if the President's goal of
finding an effective HIV vaccine within a decade is to be realized.
A second major emphasis of our recommendations relates to the fact that
no administrative mechanism currently exists to ensure the ongoing
communication and collaboration of all existing federal agencies involved in
HIV vaccine work. While the Levine commission recommended such
coordination in its report to the NIH, and while occasional and sporadic meetings
have been held among members of various Federal agencies, no one, in fact, has
been given responsibility for ensuring ongoing coordination of the federal
vaccine effort. Further, multiple complex and interrelated social and political
issues also must be addressed, for successful implementation of an AIDS
vaccine. It is clear, for example, that the pharmaceutical and biotechnology
industries must be involved, yet there is no existing mechanism to ensure their