Kampala — Researchers at the Entebbe-based Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI) are appealing to volunteers to come forward for HIV/AIDS vaccine trials.

Chief researcher Dr Pontiano Kaleebu told IRIN that so far only 10 people were participating in the trials which began in February. "The response is still poor," he said. "We still need about 40 candidates between now and 2004 to come for this exercise."

But he added that he expected them to come forward in the course of the year.

The trial is part of a partnership between the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) and the UVRI. In 2002, the IAVI and the Ugandan ministry of health agreed to work together to accelerate the development and testing of preventive AIDS vaccines for Uganda, and the rest of the world.

The volunteers in Uganda have joined others in the UK and Kenya, where trials of the vaccines have been ongoing for over two years. In Uganda, this is just Phase One of the trials.

"Larger trials will be needed to determine if the vaccines will indeed protect people against infection from HIV," the IAVI said in a statement.