ABSTRACT
The seroepidemiological survey of 400,000 persons aged 20-40 years and belonging to different AIDS risk groups, as well as blood donors, for the presence of antibodies to HIV has been carried out on the territory of Lithuania. This investigation has been made with the use of the assay systems "Antigen", "Peptoscreen" and "Vector" manufactured in the USSR, as well as commercial assay systems from foreign manufacturers, such as Du Pont de Nemours Inc., Organon N. V., Abbott Laboratories, Serodia. The comparison of the results thus obtained has revealed that high frequency of false positive results is characteristic of all assay systems under study, including immunoblotting. These data indicate that test systems based on different acting principles should be used for the detection of anti-HIV antibodies. For the first time a HIV-infected resident of Lithuania has been detected. The investigation carried out in Lithuania has shown that HIV infection is not widely spread in this region, but due to some objective reasons this does not preclude the necessity of the constant epidemiological surveillance of this infection throughout this territory in order to bar the way to this infection.
Subject(s)
Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome/epidemiology , Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome/diagnosis , Blotting, Western , False Positive Reactions , HIV Antibodies/analysis , Humans , Immunoenzyme Techniques , Lithuania/epidemiologyABSTRACT
Using a panel of sera from HIV-infected persons and donors, the authors showed that radioimmunoprecipitation assays compare favourably with immunoblotting assays. With radioimmunoprecipitation, cross reactions were observed between HIV-2 antigens and HIV-2 antibodies, and that the nature of cross reactivity differs from that observed with immunoblotting. Potentials of radioimmunoprecipitation assays as a confirmatory test for use with sera that have given indeterminate results in immunoblotting assays and contradictory results in enzyme immunoassays are examined.
Subject(s)
AIDS Serodiagnosis/methods , HIV Infections/diagnosis , HIV-1 , HIV-2 , Radioimmunoprecipitation Assay/methods , Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome/diagnosis , Cross Reactions , Diagnosis, Differential , Evaluation Studies as Topic , Fluorescent Antibody Technique , HIV Antibodies/blood , HIV Antigens/blood , HIV-1/immunology , HIV-2/immunology , Humans , Immunoblotting , Immunoenzyme Techniques , Radioimmunoassay , Sensitivity and SpecificitySubject(s)
Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome/etiology , Hemophilia A/therapy , Transfusion Reaction , Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome/diagnosis , Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome/prevention & control , Adolescent , Child , Child, Preschool , HIV Antibodies/analysis , HIV-1/immunology , Hemophilia A/complications , Humans , Male , Risk FactorsABSTRACT
Ten sera from healthy blood donors positive by enzyme-linked immunoadsorbent assay (ELISA) were studied by immunoblot assay using natural and recombinant proteins. They interacted only with p17 or p24 proteins but were nonreactive with a recombinant protein (RP 50), which carries antigenic determinants to p17 and p24. Reactions were not blocked by preincubation of sera with genetically engineered p17 and p24 or purified viral p24, indicating that some new epitopes were formed during the Western blot procedure. Recombinant gag-encoded protein is required for confirmation of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) seropositivity.
Subject(s)
HIV Antigens/immunology , HIV/immunology , Retroviridae Proteins/immunology , Viral Proteins , Blotting, Western , Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay , Epitopes/genetics , Epitopes/immunology , False Positive Reactions , Gene Products, gag , Genes, Viral , HIV/genetics , HIV Antigens/genetics , HIV Core Protein p24 , Humans , Immune Sera/immunology , Recombinant Proteins/genetics , Recombinant Proteins/immunology , Retroviridae Proteins/genetics , gag Gene Products, Human Immunodeficiency VirusABSTRACT
A recombinant antigen produced in CV-I cells infected with vaccinia virus vC5 carrying the HIV-I gag gene was used to test sera. This antigen (rp50) reacted with 95 serum specimens shown to have anticore antibodies by immunoblot based on natural HIV antigens. Six sera from blood donors positive in ELISA contained antibodies to p17, p24, or p55 by natural antigen-based blot. All these sera did not react with rp50. These patients did not belong to any known risk groups and showed no dynamics in the immunoblot pattern. We consider the reaction of their serum samples as false positive. We believe that the recombinant antigen rp50 may be used for verification of positive ELISA results.
