The termination of a $258 million HIV vaccine research program has sent shockwaves through the scientific community. The program, whose work was considered vital to the pursuit of an HIV vaccine, was shut down by the Trump management.

Officials from the HIV division of the National Institutes of Health (N.I.H.) informed the program’s leaders at Duke University and the Scripps Research institute of the decision.Both teams collaborated extensively with other research partners, and their work had implications for treatments of other illnesses, including COVID-19, snake antivenom, and autoimmune diseases.

According to a senior official at the agency, who remained anonymous, “The consortia for H.I.V./AIDS vaccine growth and immunology was reviewed by N.I.H. leadership,which does not support it moving forward.”

The official added that “N.I.H. expects to be shifting its focus toward using currently available approaches to eliminate H.I.V./AIDS.”

this termination is the latest in a series of cuts to HIV-related initiatives, notably those focused on prevention. The N.I.H.has also paused funding for a clinical trial of an HIV vaccine developed by Moderna.

Experts React to Funding Cuts

“I find it very disappointing that, at this critical juncture, the funding for highly successful H.I.V. vaccine research programs should be pulled,” said Dennis Burton, an immunologist who led the program at Scripps.

“It’s just inconceivable how shortsighted this is,” said Mitchell Warren, executive director of the H.I.V. prevention organization AVAC.

Public health experts warn that these cuts could undermine the progress made against HIV over the past few decades. The administration also withheld funds allocated to states and territories for HIV prevention. in Texas, the State Department of Health Services instructed grantees to halt all activities “until further notice.” The health department in Mecklenberg County in North Carolina has already laid off 10 staff members. Several African countries are reporting significant disruptions to their HIV prevention efforts.

Mitchell Warren, executive director of the HIV prevention organization AVAC, stated, “It’s just inconceivable how shortsighted this is.”

Impact on Future Research

While new HIV infections had been declining since 2010, the World Health Organization reported 1.3 million new cases in 2023, including approximately 120,000 children.

John Moore, an H.I.V. researcher at Weill Cornell medical in New York, warned, “The H.I.V. pandemic will never be ended without a vaccine, so killing research on one will end up killing peopel.”

“The N.I.H.’s multiyear investment in advanced vaccine technologies shouldn’t be abandoned on a whim like this,” he added.

During his first term, President Trump supported initiatives to end the HIV epidemic in the United states. However, his second administration has reduced federal support for these efforts. The N.I.H. has terminated grants related to PrEP, a highly effective preventive drug regimen for HIV infection.

The Trump administration also shut down the HIV prevention division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (C.D.C.), which provided funds to states and territories for HIV prevention, detection, and outbreak response.Health department officials have indicated that some of this work will be transferred to the yet-to-be-formed federal Administration for a Healthy America, but details remain unclear.

The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the C.D.C., N.I.H., and other federal health agencies, has not yet issued a statement.

In January, the Trump administration suspended the disbursement of funds from the President’s emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (Pepfar), a $7.5 billion program that provides the majority of HIV treatment in Africa and developing countries. The State Department later issued waivers to allow treatments to resume but did not reinstate funding for HIV prevention.

Given the repeated failures to produce an HIV vaccine,some experts have questioned the feasibility of developing a traditional vaccine against the virus. The Scripps and Duke teams had been studying the body’s immune response to the virus,focusing on broadly neutralizing antibodies,which have demonstrated long-lasting protection against multiple HIV strains in animal studies. Their work was funded by seven-year awards made in 2019.

Clinical trials based on their work may continue if N.I.H. funding for the H.I.V. Vaccine Trial Network is maintained.

Though, Mr. Warren cautioned that ending the research programs now means that there will be no new candidates in trials in a few years. “Almost everything in the field is hinged on work that those two programs are doing,” he said. “The pipeline just got clogged.”