Underevaluation of HIV-1 plasma viral load by a commercially available assay in a cluster of patients infected with HIV-1 A/G circulating recombinant form (CRF02).
The authors studied the correlation and agreement of commercially available assays in detection and quantification of the HIV-1 intersubtype A/G circulating recombinant form CRF02. The assays under comparison were Bayer Versant HIV-1 RNA, version 3.0; Roche Amplicor HIV-1 Monitor, version 1.5 (standard procedure); and Organon Teknika NucliSens HIV-1 RNA QT. Plasma samples from 114 patients infected with CRF02 were tested by the three assays under standard conditions. Although correlation among the assays was high and statistically significant for subtype B and CRF02, in the latter instance, NucliSens measured average viral load values (3.29 +/- 0.71 log(10) copies/mL) about 4 and >8 times lower than those obtained by Versant (3.90 +/- 0.90 log(10) copies/mL) and Amplicor (4.22 +/- 1.05 log(10) copies/mL), respectively. Furthermore, in a statistically significant percentage of CRF02-harboring samples, NucliSens produced viral load values undetectable or 1 log(10) lower than those obtained in Versant and Amplicor assays. Altogether, these data underline a low performance of NucliSens in detecting and quantifying viremia in plasma samples harboring the CRF02. These results are potentially important as global distribution of new HIV-1 subtypes is expanding, and recombinant strains, particularly CRF02, are emerging and becoming highly prevalent.
Amendola
Alessandra
A
Laboratory of Virology, National Institute for Infectious Diseases, Lazzaro Spallanzani IRCCS, Via Portuense 292, 00149 Rome, Italy.
Bordi
Licia
L
Angeletti
Claudio
C
Visco-Comandini
Ubaldo
U
Abbate
Isabella
I
Cappiello
Giuseppina
G
Budabbus
Mohamed A
MA
Eljhawi
Osama A
OA
Mehabresh
Mahdi I
MI
Girardi
Enrico
E
Antinori
Andrea
A
Ippolito
Giuseppe
G
Capobianchi
Maria R
MR
D000328:Adult; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D005814:Genes, Viral; D005838:Genotype; D015658:HIV Infections / Q000821:virology*; D015497:HIV-1 / Q000145:classification* / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007558:Italy; D008002:Libya; D016015:Logistic Models; D008297:Male; D012367:RNA, Viral / Q000097:blood; D011933:Reagent Kits, Diagnostic / Q000592:standards*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D019562:Viral Load
D012367:RNA, Viral; D011933:Reagent Kits, Diagnostic