TEMPO.CO, Stockholm - A new and more aggressive strain of HIV has been discovered in West Africa, say researchers at Sweden's Lund University. The new strain of the virus that causes AIDS, called A3/02, is a fusion of the two most common HIV strains in Guinea-Bissau. The strain was first discovered by the Swedish team in Guinea-Bissau in 2011.
"Individuals who are infected with the new recombinant develop AIDS within five years, and that's about two to two-and-a-half years faster than one of the parent (strains)," said Angelica Palm, one of the scientists responsible for the study based on a long-term follow-up of HIV-positive people in Guinea-Bissau.
The team published their findings in the Journal of Infectious diseases.
Researchers said the speed with which A3/02 leads to people falling ill from AIDS does not impact the effectiveness of medication on infected individuals.
"The good news is that as far as we know the medicines that are available today are equally functional on all different subtypes of variants," Palm said.
The study warns that such recombinants may be spreading fast, especially in regions with high levels of immigration, such as Europe or the United States.
Some 35.3 million people around the world are living with HIV, which destroys the immune system and has caused more than 25 million deaths since AIDS first emerged in the early 1980s, according to the World Health Organization (WTO).
REUTERS | TRIP B
