IMPLICATION OF FIVE AIDS RELATED GENES IN MOTHER-TO-CHILD TRANSMISSION AND ACQUISITION OF HUMAN IMMUNODEFICIENCY VIRUS 1 IN CAMEROON.

BACKGROUND

Genetic variants in the mother and/or infant have been described with evidence to be associated with mother-to-child transmission of HIV, but somehow with contradictory results depending on ethnic or geographic populations. We aimed at looking at the association between the allelic frequency of some genes with vertical transmission or acquisition of HIV in Cameroon.

METHODOLOGY

A total of 262 mothers (212 HIV-infected and 50 HIV non-infected) with their babies (270 in total, 42 HIV exposed-infected, 178 HIV exposed non-infected and 50 HIV non-exposed) were recruited in Yaounde-Cameroon. Their genotypes for , , , and were analyzed using polymerase chain reaction and restriction fragment length polymorphisms.

RESULTS

Allelic frequencies were 14.7%, 41.9%, 9.5% and 14.7% for , respectively in the mothers and 18.8%, 35.9%, 11.3% and 20.5% in the babies. No delta 32 mutation in the gene was found. The mutant genotype was most significantly frequent in the non-transmitter than in the transmitter (p= 0.005) for the . [Odd ratio = 1.69; 95% confidence interval: 0.1158 to 0.7277); was associated to MTCT, = 0.008.The homozygote mutants for the were significantly higher in the infected than in the exposed uninfected babies (p=0.04). The mutations in the other genes were neither implicated in the acquisition nor in the transmission.

CONCLUSION

was associated to the reduction of MTCT. The favored acquisition of HIV by babies. Our study showed that polymorphisms in chemokine ligand may be involved in MTCT.