U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention • Medical News
Intersubtype Human Immunodeficiency Virus Type 1 Superinfection Following Seroconversion to Primary Infection in Two Injection Drug Users

July 30, 2002

This study describes two persons who are each infected with two different strains of HIV-1 (CRF01_AE and subtype B). The persons are injecting drug users participating in a prospective cohort study in Bangkok, Thailand. In both cases, the second infection (called "superinfection" as opposed to primary infection) was detected several weeks after the individuals had developed a strong antiviral response to the primary infection. Molecular and serologic analyses determined that the superinfecting strain belonged to a different subtype from the primary strain.

These data show that some individuals may not have the type or amount of immune response following primary HIV-1 infection to protect against a subsequent infection with a different HIV-1 strain. This finding has important implications for vaccine design, in that vaccines based on specific HIV-1 strains may not protect against all strains. Thus, HIV-1 vaccines will need to include elements from several HIV-1 subtypes to provide complete protection.

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Excerpted from:
Journal of Virology
08.02; Vol. 76; No. 15: P. 7444-7452; Artur Ramos; Dale J. Hu; Lily Nguyen; Kim-Oanh Phan; Suphak Vanichseni; Nattawan Promadej; Kachit Choopanya; Margaret Callahan; Nancy L. Young; Janet McNichol; Timothy D. Mastro; Thomas M. Folks; Shambavi Subbarao

This article was provided by U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and is a part of the publication CDC HIV/Hepatitis/STD/TB Prevention News Update.


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