Finally, the New York team's findings suggest that the strains of HIV
infecting survivors are less virulent than the strains that sicken most people.
The strains
infecting adult patients were more similar to those common in their place of residence than their place of birth, suggesting that infections had been recently acquired, rather than carried since early childhood.
Phylogenetic analysis has enabled more conclusive assignment to species and genotypes
infecting humans and other animals (12,13).
(Blood is now screened for hepatitis C, and the risk of contracting the disease through a blood transfusion has declined.) The team also had access to the strain of virus
infecting this patient during the acute phase of the illness.
In addition, the generic makeup of the HIV
infecting the toddler did not match closely that of its mother's HIV, they report in the Dec.
Protein translocation into host epithelial cells by
infecting enteropathogenic Escherichia coli.