Sept. 24, 2009 - Thai health authorities have presented yesterday in Bangkok the results of an HIV/AIDS vaccine studey conducted on more than 16,000 people.

The study conducted in Thailand was sponsored by the US Army Medical Research and the National Institute of Health.

The experimental vaccine (known as RV144) is a combination of two genetically engineered vaccines developed by Sanofi-Aventis SA and VaxGen Inc., whih had failed in previous trials.

The protection offered by this new vaccine is very low, as it only reduces the risk of contagion by 31.2 percent, but the results give some indication that researchers are heading in the right direction.