HIV-2 infection throughout the world. A geographical perspective

ABSTRACT

The geographical distribution of HIV-2 is not fully understood. However, there is enough evidence to speculate about the origins and differentiation of this geographical pattern. Foci of infection probably developed in some African countries, such as Guinea-Bissau, Angola and Mozambique, in the 1970s. The decolonization of these countries led to the movement of people, and the virus, to historically associated countries such as Portugal, India and Brazil. In Ivory Coast, a focus was probably created due to the dismantling of the plantation economy, with all its demographic, cultural and social consequences. The virus was dispersed to countries close to the Guinea and Ivory Coast foci by the migration of workers and prostitutes. Thus, the diseases has spread from the Atlantic coast of Africa, where it was endemic-sporadic, to other more distant African countries and out of Africa into Europe and North America. The political emancipation of African countries is further increasing and diversifying human movements between countries. The infection has not created an epidemic, either within or outside Africa. This is due to the limited infectivity of the virus and the particular characteristics of the social and epidemiological system. The high-risk groups do not sustain an epidemic relay of the infection and subjects introducing the virus into new areas outside the African foci rarely set up a new autonomous circulation of the virus.