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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2018 Jan 17.
Published in final edited form as: N Engl J Med. 2016 Sep 22;375(12):1195. doi: 10.1056/NEJMc1609157#SA1

Acute HIV-1 Infection in Adults in East Africa and Thailand

Dvora Joseph Davey 1, Robert Bolan 2, Jeffrey D Klausner 3
PMCID: PMC5770983  NIHMSID: NIHMS932243  PMID: 27653578

TO THE EDITOR

The study by Robb et al. (June 2 issue)1 provides valuable data to aid in understanding the onset and dynamics of acute HIV-1 viremia. We compared the results from that study with data that we obtained from 2011 through 2015 regarding the viral load in 164 men who have sex with men and who had detectable HIV-1 RNA with a concurrent negative HIV-antibody result at our clinical site in Los Angeles. The median plasma viral RNA level in our patients was 5.9 log10 copies per milliliter, which is between the initial viral load found in East Africa and Thailand (4.0 log10 copies per milliliter) and the sample 13 days later (6.7 log10 copies per milliliter). The HIV subtypes differ between the one found in the majority of patients in the United States (subtype B) and those found in East Africa (subtype A) and Thailand (subtype E). The identification of patients with acute HIV-1 infection is critical in the effort to accelerate the elimination of viral transmission. Additional analyses are needed to determine the roles of the subtype on the duration of peak viremia and the viral-load set point in transmission dynamics and disease progression, respectively.2,3

Footnotes

No potential conflict of interest relevant to this letter was reported.

Contributor Information

Dvora Joseph Davey, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA

Robert Bolan, Los Angeles LGBT Center, Los Angeles, CA

Jeffrey D. Klausner, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA

References

  • 1.Robb ML, Eller LA, Kibuuka H, et al. Prospective study of acute HIV-1 infection in adults in East Africa and Thailand. N Engl J Med. 2016;374:2120–30. doi: 10.1056/NEJMoa1508952. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
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