Chinese scientists working on new HIV vaccine

HONG KONG: Scientists here and on the mainland are working on an AIDS vaccine to protect against three variants of HIV sweeping across southern and western areas of the mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Chen Zhiwei, director of the new AIDS Institute in Hong Kong, said scientists have been using gene sequencing to track how HIV viruses on the mainland are evolving, and their geographical spread.

Two closely related HIV variants had been spread by intravenous drug users (IDUs) from southwestern Yunnan province; one to as far as Xinjiang in the northwest, and the second to Guangdong in the south.