An international collaboration led by researchers at the University of Oxford's Big Data Institute uncovered a new, highly virulent strain of the HIV-1 virus in the Netherlands.
Their findings, published on Thursday in the journal Science, revealed that patients infected with the "VB variant" had 3.5 to 5.5 times more quantities of the virus in their blood than those infected with other variants, as well as a faster fading immune system.
The study also discovered that after starting treatment, those with the VB variant had similar immune system recovery and survival rates as people with other HIV variants.
"There's no cause for alarm with this new viral variant," said Oxford epidemiologist Chris Wymant, the lead author on the paper, in an interview with AFP.
According to the researchers, the mutation first appeared in the Netherlands in the late 1980s and early 1990s, but then began to diminish around 2010.
Because modern therapies appear to be effective against the variant, the research team concludes that widespread HIV treatment in the Netherlands did not contribute to the virus's evolution and that early detection and treatment are critical.
"Our findings emphasize the importance of World Health Organization guidance that individuals at risk of acquiring HIV have access to regular testing to allow early diagnosis, followed by immediate treatment," co-author Christophe Fraser said in a press release announcing the findings.
The findings also lend support to the premise that viruses can evolve to become more virulent, a widely held belief with few real-world instances.
Another recent example was the Delta variant of the novel coronavirus.
The scientists discovered 109 persons infected with the VB variant, with only four of them living outside of the Netherlands but still in Western Europe.
Because the HIV virus is constantly developing, each person infected has a slightly different version. The VB variant, however, was discovered to have over 500 mutations.
By processing a large data set from the BEEHIVE project, a data gathering and analysis endeavor in Europe and Uganda, the research team discovered the VB variant in 17 HIV positive people.
They looked at data from 6,700 HIV-positive Dutch people and found 92 more because 15 of the 17 were from the Netherlands.
The VB variant first appeared in their data in a person diagnosed in 1992 with an early version of the variant, and the most recent appearance was in 2014.
Experts caution that the discovery of the HIV variant should serve as a reminder that thinking that viruses will simply evolve to become milder is a dangerous statement.
