Expansion of HIV BF recombinants among men who have sex with men (MSM) in Buenos Aires, Argentina

MARONE R; AVILA MM; PANDO MA; CARBALLO DIEGUEZ A; BALAN I

Paris

Congreso; 9th IAS Conference on HIV Science (IAS 2017); 2017

IAS

Objective: Several HIV epidemiological studies performed among MSM from Buenos Aires, Argentina revealed high HIV prevalence (11-17%) and incidence (4.5 per 100 persons-year). First studies on molecular epidemiology established that subtype B dominated the epidemic among MSM while BF recombinants were more frequent among heterosexual men and women. The objective of the study was to describe the subtype diversity of HIV among MSM along 10 years of epidemiological studies in Buenos Aires, Argentina (2000-2009). Methods: Four different studies were performed from 2000 to 2009 (Study 1, 2, 3 and 4). All the studies included self-reported MSM, including those who have other partners (women and/or transgender) and those who exclusively have male partners. HIV DNA/RNA was isolated from cells/plasma samples using commercial kits and pol gene was amplified from positions 2143 to 3798 (HXB2 numbering) and sequenced in an automatic sequencer. The phylogenetic analysis was performed by Neighbor-joining and bootscanning. Results: A total of 293 pol gene sequences were obtained and phylogenetic analysis revealed that 221 (75.4%) were subtype B and 72 were BF recombinants (24.6%). Temporal analysis demonstrated that frequency of subtype B significantly decreased over time: 89.6% in Study 1, 83.3% in Study 2, 71.2% in Study 3 and 58.5% in Study 4 (p