The latent HIV-1 reservoir in patients undergoing HAART: an archive of pre-HAART drug resistance.
Recent studies on patients with a history of pre-HAART drug resistance, but currently on a successful regimen, provided new insights into the dynamics of the latent cellular viral reservoir. Results indicated that the latent reservoir is an archive, composed of a mixture of wild-type and drug-resistant strains. The studies showed that, even after years of successful HAART, the wild-type viral strains that circulated before the initiation of the therapy as well as all the different drug-resistant viral strains that evolved over time during eventual periods of non-suppressive treatment, remain detectable in the proviral reservoir. These findings support the hypothesis that during active viral replication, new variants, including drug-resistant ones, continuously enter the latent viral reservoir. It can be concluded that, as a consequence of the lifelong conservation of this latent reservoir, the potency of drugs for which resistance once developed will remain reduced, even after years of withdrawal of the drug.
Noë
Ann
A
AIDS Reference Laboratory, Ghent University Hospital, De Pintelaan 185, B-9000 Gent, Belgium.
Plum
Jean
J
Verhofstede
Chris
C
D023241:Antiretroviral Therapy, Highly Active; D024882:Drug Resistance, Viral; D015658:HIV Infections / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000821:virology*; D015497:HIV-1 / Q000187:drug effects* / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D017735:Virus Latency