HIV Vaccine Awareness Day on 18 May commemorates U.S. President Bill Clinton’s 1997 declaration that, “only a truly effective, preventive HIV vaccine can limit and eventually eliminate the threat of AIDS.”

Despite remarkable advances in treatment and prevention since then, HIV/AIDS is still neither contained nor manageable. In 2014 alone, AIDS killed more than 1.2 million people globally and HIV newly infected 2 million people, with two-thirds of them in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Recent modeling data shows us that even with substantially increased use of existing treatment and prevention options there will be hundreds of thousands of new HIV infections per year in low- and middle-income countries for decades to come.

“Access to and use of existing HIV prevention and treatment tools is imperative but unlikely to end the AIDS epidemic,” says IAVI’s CEO Mark Feinberg. “Further investment and innovation in HIV prevention will be required to realize our shared vision of a world without AIDS. We must make better use of the tools we have, and we must develop new tools that are more effective and accessible to all.”

The world needs an AIDS vaccine, and science can get us there. Promising new vaccine candidates are progressing toward clinical evaluation, with late-stage studies about to begin for some. Watch and share the videos below featuring leading voices in HIV vaccine R&D and then raise your own voice using the Twitter hashtag #HVAD.

Modeling Shows a Vaccine is Essential to Conclusively and Sustainably End HIV/AIDS

Added to the comprehensive HIV/AIDS response, an effective and well-implemented vaccine could prevent the majority of new HIV infections, driving down the number of people who need life-long treatment, and ultimately the total costs of global HIV/AIDS programs. Read more... 

 * Potential reduction of new annual HIV infections in low- and middle-income countries by a 70% efficacious and well implemented vaccine. Click here for further details.