Laboratory

Understanding the dynamics within HIV transmission clusters is critical information that can help prioritize public health resource allocation. Although HIV sequence clustering is routinely used to identify subpopulations experiencing elevated transmission, there’s a risk of over-simplifying transmission dynamics within clusters as well as the risk that clustering methodology influences outcomes.

A new research report by the BC-CfE adds to the growing body of evidence that elderly individuals don’t mount as strong, or durable, immune responses to the COVID-19 vaccines as compared to younger individuals. This COVID-19 Immunity Task Force (CITF)-funded study was done in collaboration with Providence Health Care and Simon Fraser University. The study is currently in pre-print and has not yet been peer-reviewed.

The BC-CfE’s Laboratory and its Director, Dr. Zabrina Brumme, are celebrating another recent success in being awarded grant funding for research. The BC-CfE, along with frequent collaborating partner Simon Fraser University, are now a part of the U.S.-based Research Enterprise to Advance a Cure for HIV (REACH) Collaboratory.

BC’s provincial state of emergency, in place since March of 2020 due to COVID-19, was lifted on July 1st. While the pandemic endures around the world, BC’s vaccine rates are high and continue to climb and case counts are steadily dropping.