Evolution of HIV virulence in response to widespread scale up of antiretroviral therapy: a modeling study.

ABSTRACT: There are global increases in the use of HIV antiretroviral therapy (ART), guided by clinical benefits of early ART initiation and the efficacy of treatment as prevention of transmission. Separately, it has been shown theoretically and empirically that HIV virulence can evolve over time; observed virulence levels may reflect an adaptive balance between infected lifespan and per-contact transmission rate. However, the potential effects of widespread ART usage on HIV virulence are unknown. To predict these effects, we used an agent-based stochastic model to simulate evolutionary trends in HIV virulence, using set point viral load as a proxy for virulence. We calibrated our model to prevalence and incidence trends of South Africa. We explored two distinct ART scenarios: (1) ART initiation bas

SUBMITTER: Herbeck JT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5822883 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature