NIAID's HIV/AIDS Research Program

Although progress has been made in the global fight against HIV/AIDS, the epidemic continues to devastate the United States and the international community with 56,300 new HIV infections each year in the U.S. and an estimated 33 million people living with HIV worldwide. As the leading U.S. government institute for HIV/AIDS research, NIAID is committed to conducting the research necessary to successfully end the fight against HIV/AIDS.

Through laboratories and clinics on the NIH campus in Bethesda, Md., and a vast network of supported research at universities, medical centers and clinical trial sites around the globe, NIAID is working to better understand HIV and how it causes disease, find new tools to prevent HIV infection including a preventive vaccine, develop new and more effective treatments for people infected with HIV, and hopefully, find a cure.

Finding an Effective HIV Vaccine

Historically, vaccines have been our best weapon in the fight against mankind’s worst infectious diseases, including smallpox and polio. HIV, however, is different from other infectious diseases in that the human body seems incapable of mounting an effective immune response to block the virus from progressing to disease. Further, there is not one documented case of anyone being truly cured of HIV infection. NIAID is conducting fundamental research to better understand how the HIV interacts with the human immune system and is testing the most promising vaccine candidates when scientifically appropriate. And although a vaccine to prevent HIV infection remains the goal, NIAID is also examining vaccines that could significantly alter the course of disease and infectiousness of people infected with HIV, which could provide positive health benefits both for infected individuals and the larger community.

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