Clinical and laboratory characteristics of HIV-1 infection in Zimbabwe

Article Abstract:

The majority of studies describing the progression of human immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV) infection and the development of AIDS have taken place in the United States and Europe. In these areas, AIDS is largely a disease of homosexual men and intravenous drug users. In contrast, many of the cases of AIDS in Africa have occurred in heterosexual men and women who have not received blood products or transfusions and do not use intravenous drugs. However, clinical and laboratory investigation on 265 HIV-positive individuals in Zimbabwe generally revealed few differences from infected individuals in Europe and the United States. The frequency of lymphadenopathy was somewhat higher than in Europe and America, and blood levels of viral protein p24 were found to be lower. Otherwise, the symptoms and other laboratory values, such as the number of CD4 cells, were comparable. A few lines of evidence suggested that the introduction of AIDS to Zimbabwe has been relatively recent. In the families of the HIV-infected patients in this study, the only infected children were younger than three years. Nearly all the infected patients gave a history which included sexual activity and sexually transmitted disease within the past one or two years. While both types of the AIDS virus, HIV-1 and HIV-2, have been found to cause AIDS in Africa, testing of the patients' blood using highly specific synthetic viral antigens revealed no evidence of HIV-2 infection in the patients tested in Zimbabwe. (Consumer Summary produced by Reliance Medical Information, Inc.)

HIV infection, HIV infections, Zimbabwe, AIDS (Disease), AIDS virus carriers, HIV carriers

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Virus excretion in the cervicovaginal secretions of pregnant and nonpregnant HIV-infected women

Article Abstract:

Cell-free HIV virus and HIV-infected cells found in the cervicovaginal secretions of HIV-infected women may play a role in female-to-male and mother-to-infant transmission of HIV. Of cervicovaginal samples from 55 pregnant and nonpregnant HIV-infected women, 12 samples (21.8%) tested positive for the cell-free virus, and another five samples were positive for HIV-infected cells. Altogether, HIV was detected in 31% of the secretions. Virus excretion occurred in 38% of the pregnant women compared with only 11.8% of the nonpregnant women. Virus was as likely to be excreted from women taking zidovudine as from women who were not. The presence of HIV in cervicovaginal secretions was not linked with stage of disease, history of sexually transmitted diseases or means of original infection with HIV.

Analysis, HIV (Viruses), HIV, Disease transmission, Cervix mucus

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