Former U.S. AIDS
czar joins Immune Response Corp.

Joseph O'Neill, the gay former director of the Office of National AIDS Policy at the White House, has been named chief executive officer and president of Immune Response Corp., a biopharmaceutical company focusing on HIV and multiple sclerosis research. O'Neill, who succeeds John N. Bonfiglio at Immune Response, helped craft the 2003 President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, a $15 billion global initiative to combat the AIDS epidemic.

Immune Response had developed an experimental HIV vaccine called Remune that was hoped to prevent HIV infection but was shown in a November 2000 study to be ineffective. The vaccine is currently being studied to see if adding it to an antiretroviral drug cocktail enhances the medications' anti-HIV activity. The company also is developing IR103, an immune-based therapy to treat HIV, and NeuroVax, an immune-based treatment for MS. (Advocate.com)