Twenty years of prospective molecular epidemiology in Senegal: changes in HIV diversity.

Over a 20-year period we have observed the dynamics of HIV-1 subtypes and HIV-2 infection in a prospective cohort of registered female sex workers (FSW) in Dakar, Senegal. Prevalence and incidence rates for HIV-1 and HIV-2 are described from 290 seroprevalent and 193 seroincident subjects who were among the 3,910 women enrolled between 1985 and 2004. We report a significant decrease of HIV-2 prevalence in the cohort, parallel to the introduction and rise of HIV-1 infection. In 328 HIV-1-infected women, a 385-bp C2-V3 fragment of the envelope gene was sequenced and classified into the following subtypes or recombinant forms: 239 (72%) were subtype A [of which 180 (55%) were CRF02_AG and 53 (16%) were A3], 10 (3%) were B, 12 (4%) were C, 11 (4%) were D, 18 (6%) were G, 24 (7%) were CRF06_cpx, and 7 (2%) were CRF09_cpx. We found an increasing proportion of CRF02_AG over many years, but recently subsubtype A3 has over-taken CRF02_AG, with the largest proportion of new infections. The predominance of existing HIV-1 subtypes did not preclude the emergence and increase of other closely related subtypes or recombinant forms. This 20-year prospective serological and sequence analysis of HIV viruses reveals a complex and changing HIV epidemic in Senegal.

Treponemal infection rates, risk factors and pregnancy outcome in a rural area of Senegal.

A rural population of east Senegal has been under demographic surveillance for more than 30 years and a high rate of infertility has been reported. The aim of the study is to describe HIV and treponemal infection epidemiology and association with outcome of pregnancy in a population of rural Senegal. A population-based cross-sectional study was conducted among 952 randomly-selected adults of a rural community of Senegal. No participant was found to be infected with HIV, 11% had evidence of past syphilis and 5% of active syphilis. Active syphilis was associated among men with age, long-term mobility and having partners in an urban area in the last 12 months and among women with being divorced or widowed. No association was found between past or active syphilis and abortion or stillbirth but women aged 40 and more with past or active syphilis were significantly more likely to have had no history of gestation than women with no evidence of syphilis infection. In conclusion our results call for more research to understand the epidemiology of treponemal infection and to elucidate types of Treponema pallidum involved.

Comparison of heterologous neutralizing antibody responses of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1)- and HIV-2-infected Senegalese patients: distinct patterns of breadth and magnitude distinguish HIV-1 and HIV-2 infections.

Neutralizing antibody responses against heterologous isolates in human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) and HIV-2 infections were compared, and their relationships with established clinical markers of progression were examined. Neutralizing responses against 7 heterologous primary isolates and 1 laboratory strain were compared between 32 untreated HIV-1-infected subjects and 35 untreated HIV-2-infected subjects using a pseudotyped reporter virus assay. The breadth of the neutralizing response, defined as the proportion of panel viruses positively neutralized by patient plasma, was significantly greater among HIV-2-infected subjects than among HIV-1-infected subjects. Notably, for fully one-third of HIV-2 subjects, all viruses were effectively neutralized in our panel. Magnitudes of responses, defined as reciprocal 50% inhibitory concentration (IC(50)) titers for positive reactions, were significantly greater among HIV-1-infected subjects than among HIV-2-infected subjects. When plasma samples from HIV-1 patients were tested for cross-neutralization of HIV-2 and vice versa, we found that these intertype responses are very rare and their prevalences comparable in both HIV-1 and HIV-2 infection. The significantly higher magnitude of heterologous responses for HIV-1 compared to HIV-2 prompted us to examine associations with viremia, which is known to be significantly higher in HIV-1 infection. Importantly, there was a significant positive correlation between the IC(50) titer and viral load within both the HIV-1 and HIV-2 groups, suggesting heterologous antibodies may be driven by viral replication. We conclude that HIV-2 infection is characterized by a broad, low-magnitude intratype neutralization response, while HIV-1 is characterized by a narrower but higher-magnitude intratype response and that a significant positive association between the IC(50) titer and viremia is common to both HIV-1 and HIV-2 infections.

The absence of anti-Tat antibodies is associated with risk of disease progression in HIV-2 infection.

The Tat protein of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is essential for viral replication and has extracellular pathogenic activity. We sought to determine whether the anti-Tat antibody response was predictive of disease progression in 144 HIV type 2 (HIV-2)-infected subjects observed longitudinally between 1985 and 2003. Sixty-eight percent of the subjects tested positive for anti-Tat antibodies, with reactivity notably established early after seroconversion and stably maintained over the course of infection. The risk and rate of progression to advanced HIV-2 AIDS was significantly higher in anti-Tat-negative subjects than in anti-Tat-positive subjects, extending the importance of this prognostic marker for HIV-2 AIDS.

Viral dynamics of primary HIV-1 infection in Senegal, West Africa.

BACKGROUND: Few studies have addressed primary human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) type 1 infection in sub-Saharan Africa, where the epidemic is of a predominantly heterosexual character and is caused by different subtypes. The present study examines the dynamics of viral replication in subjects infected with various HIV-1 subtypes. METHODS: Seven hundred fifty-two HIV-negative Senegalese women at high risk for infection were monitored every 3 months for acute/early HIV infection; 26 infections were identified (23 HIV-1 and 3 HIV-2), with an HIV-1 incidence rate of 3.23 cases/person-years observation. Multiple viral-load measurements were taken for all seroconverters. RESULTS: The mean+/-standard deviation viral load for all subjects during the early stage of infection was 4.13+/-0.66 log10 copies/mL, with an overall decrease of 0.22 log10 copies/mL after the early stage; the viral set point was reached after 12 months of infection. Most subjects had relatively low viral loads during the early stage of infection. HIV-1 CRF02_AG-infected women had a significantly higher mean viral load during the early stage of infection (mean +/- SD, 4.45+/-0.60 log(10) copies/mL) than did non-HIV-1 CRF02_AG-infected women (mean+/-SD, 3.78+/-0.46 log(10) copies/mL) (P=.008). None of the subjects reported symptoms consistent with primary HIV-1 infection. CONCLUSION: Our findings in Senegalese women differ from what have been described for primary HIV-1 infection. Further investigations of primary infections with non-B subtypes are warranted, to better characterize their differences with primary infections with subtype B.

Comparison of HIV-1 and HIV-2 infectivity from a prospective cohort study in Senegal.

From a prospective cohort study of 1948 initially human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) uninfected female commercial sex workers followed between 1985 and 1999 in Dakar, Senegal, the authors compared the male to female per infectious sexual exposure transmission probability of HIV types one (HIV-1) and two (HIV-2). New non-parametric competing risks failure time methods were used, which minimized modelling assumptions and controlled for risk factors for HIV infection. The HIV-1 versus HIV-2 infectivity ratio over time was estimated by the ratio of smoothed non-parametric kernel estimates of the HIV-1 and HIV-2 infection hazard functions in sex workers, adjusted by an estimate of the relative HIV-1 versus HIV-2 prevalence in the partner population. HIV-1 was found to be significantly more infectious than HIV-2 throughout the follow-up period (P < 0.001). The HIV-1/HIV-2 infectivity ratio was inferred to be approximately constant over time, with estimated common value 3.55. The finding of greater HIV-1 infectivity persisted in sensitivity analyses and in covariate-adjusted analyses, with adjusted infectivity ratio estimates ranging between 3.40 and 3.86. Understanding the mechanisms by which HIV-1 infects more efficiently than HIV-2 may be useful in the development of HIV-1 vaccines. Additionally, the methodology developed here may be useful for analysing other data sets.

Molecular epidemiology of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 sub-subtype A3 in Senegal from 1988 to 2001.

The global human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)epidemic is characterized by significant genetic diversity in circulating viruses. We have recently characterized a group of viruses that form a distinct sub-subtype within the subtype A radiation, which we have designated HIV type 1 (HIV-1) sub-subtype A, circulating in West Africa. A prospective study of a cohort of female sex workers (FSW) in Dakar, Senegal over an 18-year period indicated that an A3-specific sequence in the C2-V3 region of the env gene was found in 46 HIV-1-infected women. HIV-1 sub-subtype A3 appeared in the FSW population as early as 1988 and continued to be transmitted as of 2001. We also found that HIV-1 A3 is not confined to the FSW cohort in Senegal but is also circulating in the general population in Dakar. Furthermore, analyses of viral sequences from a few other West and Central African countries also demonstrated evidence of HIV-1 A3 sequence in isolates from HIV-1-infected people in Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Niger, Guinea Bissau, Benin, and Equatorial Guinea. Overall, because of the evidence of sub-subtype A3 in the general population in Senegal, as well as in a few neighboring West and Central African countries, along with the increasing incidence of infection with A3-containing viruses in the Dakar high-risk FSW population, we feel that HIV-1 sub-subtype A3 viruses are important to distinguish and monitor.