Scientists at the University of Oxford recently released the news of the discovery of a new variant of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) in the Netherlands, called BV. This new variant deteriorates the immune system faster than other variants. The information was released in the journal Science, and was disseminated by El Nacional.
Is everything bad with the VB Variant of HIV?
According to the study, there are two aspects which is good and the other is not so good about the information handled in this regard.
The good news is that existing antiretroviral treatments are equally effective against this variant of HIV.
The bad news is that treatment should be started more urgently, since the virus progresses faster. That also means that patients need to be diagnosed as soon as possible.
Research results from people infected with ‘variant VB’ (for ‘virulent subtype B’) showed significant differences before antiretroviral treatment, compared to those infected with other HIV variants.
In addition, patients with the VB variant also showed a higher risk of transmitting the virus to other people.
What risk does the mutation of a virus represent?
The risk posed by viruses evolving towards greater virulence, i.e. causing greater damage to their hosts, has been extensively studied in theoretical work despite few examples at the population level . The most notable recent example is the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) lineage B.1.617.2 (Delta variant), for which a higher probability of death as well as higher transmissibility have been reported.
109 people have the VB variant
The VB variant was first identified in 17 seropositive people from the BEEHIVE project. This is an ongoing study collecting samples from across Europe and Uganda.
But 15 of the people infected with that variant came from the Netherlands. Which is why the researchers analyzed data from a sample of more than 6,700 HIV-positive people in that nation
With this, another 92 people with the variant were detected, coming from all regions of the Netherlands, bringing the total to 109 so far.
