[ES] En España, la proporción de inmigrantes en la población general y entre las personas con infección por VIH es creciente en los últimos años. Sin embargo, la información sobre las tendencias temporales de la epidemia en inmigrantes y sobre sus características sociodemográficas, epidemiológicas y clínicas es escasa, y está fraccionada en diversas fuentes de información que cubren aspectos complementarios. Los objetivos de este trabajo fueron analizar las fuentes de información disponibles que permiten caracterizar la epidemiología de la infección por VIH en los inmigrantes en España, y describir la situación actual de la epidemia en este grupo de población a partir de la información disponible en dichas fuentes. [EN] Lately Spain, the proportion of immigrants has increased in both general and HIV-infected populations. Nevertheles, data on the temporal trends of the epidemic in immigrants and on their sociodemographic, epidemiologic and clinical characteristics are scarce and are scattered in various information sources that cover complementary aspects of this issue. The objectives of the present study were to analyze the available information sources that allow the epidemiology of HIV infection in immigrants in Spain to be studied, and to describe the current situation of HIV infection in immigrants, based on the available information sources. ; Este estudio ha sido financiado por la Red de Sida (Redes Temáticas de Investigación Cooperativa, RD06/006). ; Sí
BACKGROUND: In the European Union/European Economic Area (EU/EEA), migrants from high-endemic countries are disproportionately affected by HIV. Between 2007 and 2012, migrants represented 39 % of reported HIV cases. There is growing evidence that a significant proportion of HIV acquisition among migrant populations occurs after their arrival in Europe. DISCUSSION: Migrants are confronted with multiple risk factors that shape patterns of population HIV susceptibility and vulnerability, which simultaneously affect HIV transmission. Undocumented migrants incur additional risks for contracting HIV due to limited access to adequate health care services, protection and justice, alongside insecure housing and employment conditions. All EU/EEA countries have ratified a number of international and regional human rights instruments that enshrine access to health care as a human right that should be available to everyone without discrimination. From a clinical and public health perspective, early HIV care and treatment is associated with viral suppression, improved health outcomes and reductions in transmission risks. A current challenge of the HIV epidemic is to reach the highest proportion of overall viral suppression among people living with HIV in order to impact on HIV transmission. Although the majority of EU/EEA countries regard migrants as an important sub-population for their national responses to HIV, and despite the overwhelming evidence of the individual and public health benefits associated with HIV care and treatment, a significant number of EU/EEA countries do not provide antiretroviral treatment to undocumented migrants. HIV transmission dynamics in migrant populations depend on the respective weight of all risk and vulnerability factors to which they are exposed, which act together in a synergistic way. People who are not linked to HIV care will continue to unwillingly contribute to the on-going transmission of HIV. Following the recommendations of the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, ensuring access to HIV-care for all sub-populations, including undocumented migrants, would fulfil the human rights of those populations and also strengthen the control of HIV incidence among those not currently able to access HIV care. ; The authors would like to thank and acknowledge the members of the ECDC workshop on improving the monitoring of HIV among migrant populations in Europe that took place in Madrid, Spain, 3–4 October, 2013, for encouraging ECDC to commission the drafting of this manuscript. ; Sí
In the context of an European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) research project, our objective was to describe current recommendations regarding HIV testing and counselling targeting migrants and ethnic minorities in the European Union/European Economic Area/European Free Trade Association (EU/EEA/EFTA) Member States. An on-line survey was conducted among 31 EU/EEA/EFTA Member States. The survey inquired on the existence of specific HIV testing and counselling recommendations or policies for migrants and/or ethnic minorities and the year of their publication. Additionally, we performed a review of national recommendations, guidelines or any other policy documents retrieved from an Internet search through the different countries' competent bodies. Twenty-nine (94%) country representatives responded the survey, and 28 documents from 27 countries were identified. National guidelines on HIV testing are heterogeneous and tailored, according to the epidemiological situation. Twenty-two countries identify migrants and four countries identify ethnic minorities as particularly vulnerable to HIV. Sixteen countries explicitly recommend offering an HIV test to migrants/ethnic minorities. Guidelines especially target people originating from HIV endemic countries, and benefits of HIV early detection are highlighted. HIV testing is not mandatory in any country, but some countries overtly facilitate this practice. Benefits of HIV testing in migrants and ethnic minorities, at both individual and community levels are recognized by many countries. In spite of this, not all countries identify the need to test these groups. ; European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, Spanish Network of HIV/AIDS Research [RIS- RD06/0006] and the Biomedical Research Centre Network for Epidemiology and Public Health [CIBER de Epidemiología y Salud Pública]. ; Sí
BACKGROUND: Migrant populations from countries with generalised HIV epidemics make up a significant proportion of all HIV/AIDS cases in many European Union and European Economic Area (EU/EEA) countries, with heterosexual transmission the predominant mode of HIV acquisition. While most of these infections are diagnosed for the first time in Europe, acquisition is believed to have predominantly occurred in the home country. A proportion of HIV transmission is believed to be occurring post-migration, and many countries may underestimate the degree to which this is occurring. Our objectives were to review the literature estimating the proportion of migrants believed to have acquired their HIV post-migration and examine which EU member states are able to provide estimates of probable country of HIV acquisition through current surveillance systems. METHODS: A systematic review was undertaken to gather evidence of sexual transmission of HIV within Europe among populations from countries with a generalised epidemic. In addition, national surveillance focal points from 30 EU/EEA Member States were asked to complete a questionnaire about surveillance methods and monitoring of the likely place of HIV acquisition among migrants. RESULTS & DISCUSSION: Twenty-seven papers from seven countries were included in the review and 24 countries responded to the survey. Estimates of HIV acquisition post-migration ranged from as low as 2% among sub Saharan Africans in Switzerland, to 62% among black Caribbean men who have sex with men (MSM) in the UK. Surveillance methods for monitoring post-migration acquisition varied across the region; a range of methods are used to estimate country or region of HIV acquisition, including behavioural and clinical markers. There is little published evidence addressing this issue, although Member States highlight the importance of migrant populations in their epidemics. CONCLUSIONS: There is post-migration HIV acquisition among migrants in European countries but this is difficult to quantify accurately with current data. Migrant MSM appear at particular risk of HIV acquisition post-migration. Countries that identify migrants as an important part of their HIV epidemic should focus on using an objective method for assigning probable country of HIV acquisition. Robust methods to measure HIV incidence should be considered in order to inform national prevention programming and resource allocation. ; This study was commissioned and funded by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC). ; Sí
HIV cohort data from high-income European countries were compared with the UNAIDS Spectrum modelling parameters for these same countries to validate mortality rates and excess mortality estimates for people living with HIV (PLHIV) on antiretroviral therapy (ART). Data from 2000 to 2015 were analysed from the Antiretroviral Therapy Cohort Collaboration (ART-CC) for Austria, Denmark, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and Switzerland. Flexible parametric models were used to compare all-cause mortality rates in the ART-CC and Spectrum. The percentage of AIDS-related deaths and excess mortality (both are the same within Spectrum) were compared, with excess mortality defined as that in excess of the general population mortality. Analyses included 94 026 PLHIV with 585 784 person-years of follow-up, from which there were 5515 deaths. All-cause annual mortality rates in Spectrum for 2000-2003 were 0.0121, reducing to 0.0078 in 2012-2015, whilst the ART-CC's corresponding annual mortality rates were 0.0151 [95% confidence interval (95% CI): 0.0130-0.0171] reducing to 0.0049 (95% CI: 0.0039-0.0060). The percentage of AIDS-related deaths in Spectrum was 74.7% in 2000-2003, dropping to 43.6% in 2012-2015. In the ART-CC, AIDS-related mortality constitutes 45.3% (95% CI: 38.4-52.9%) of mortality in 2000-2003 and 26.7% (95% CI: 19-46%) between 2012 and 2015. Excess mortality in the ART-CC was broadly similar to the Spectrum estimates, dropping from 75.3% (95% CI: 60.3-95.2%) in 2000-2003 to 30.7% (95% CI: 25.5-63.7%) in 2012-2015. All-cause mortality assumptions for PLHIV on ART in high-income European settings should be adjusted in Spectrum to be higher in 2000-2003 and decline more quickly to levels currently captured for recent years. ; Funding: This work was supported by the UK Medical Research Council (MRC; grant number MR/J002380/1) and the UK Department for International Development (DFID) under the MRC/DFID Concordat agreement and is also part of the EDCTP2 programme supported by the European Union. The ART-CC is ...
People living with HIV (PLHIV) are more likely than the general population to develop AIDS-defining malignancies (ADMs) and several non-ADMs (NADMs). Information is lacking on survival outcomes and cause-specific mortality after cancer diagnosis among PLHIV. We investigated causes of death within 5 years of cancer diagnosis in PLHIV enrolled in European and North American HIV cohorts starting antiretroviral therapy (ART) 1996-2015, aged ≥16 years, and subsequently diagnosed with cancer. Cancers were grouped: ADMs, viral NADMs and nonviral NADMs. We calculated cause-specific mortality rates (MR) after diagnosis of specific cancers and compared 5-year survival with the UK and France general populations. Among 83,856 PLHIV there were 4,436 cancer diagnoses. Of 603 deaths after ADM diagnosis, 292 (48%) were due to an ADM. There were 467/847 (55%) and 74/189 (39%) deaths that were due to an NADM after nonviral and viral NADM diagnoses, respectively. MR were higher for diagnoses between 1996 and 2005 versus 2006-2015: ADMs 102 (95% CI 92-113) per 1,000 years versus 88 (78-100), viral NADMs 134 (106-169) versus 111 (93-133) and nonviral NADMs 264 (232-300) versus 226 (206-248). Estimated 5-year survival for PLHIV diagnosed with liver (29% [19-39%]), lung (18% [13-23%]) and cervical (75% [63-84%]) cancer was similar to general populations. Survival after Hodgkin's lymphoma diagnosis was lower in PLHIV (75% [67-81%]). Among ART-treated PLHIV diagnosed with cancer, MR and causes of death varied by cancer type, with mortality highest for liver and lung cancers. Deaths within 5 years of NADM diagnoses were more likely to be from cancer than AIDS. ; We would like to thank all patients, doctors, and study nurses associated with the participating cohort studies. This work was supported by the UK Medical Research Council (MRC; grant number MR/J002380/1) and the UK Department for International Development (DFID) under the MRC/DFID Concordat agreement and is also part of the EDCTP2 programme supported by the European Union. The ...
Background. Previous genetic association studies of human immunodeficiency virus-1 (HIV-1) progression have focused on common human genetic variation ascertained through genome-wide genotyping. Methods. We sought to systematically assess the full spectrum of functional variation in protein coding gene regions on HIV-1 progression through exome sequencing of 1327 individuals. Genetic variants were tested individually and in aggregate across genes and gene sets for an influence on HIV-1 viral load. Results. Multiple single variants within the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) region were observed to be strongly associated with HIV-1 outcome, consistent with the known impact of classical HLA alleles. However, no single variant or gene located outside of the MHC region was significantly associated with HIV progression. Set-based association testing focusing on genes identified as being essential for HIV replication in genome-wide small interfering RNA (siRNA) and clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR) studies did not reveal any novel associations. Conclusions. These results suggest that exonic variants with large effect sizes are unlikely to have a major contribution to host control of HIV infection. ; This study has been financed in part within the framework of the Swiss HIV Cohort Study (www.shcs.ch) project #651 and supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation (www.snf.ch) grant #148522 (J.F.). The International HIV Controllers Study was made possible through a generous donation from the Mark and Lisa Schwartz Foundation and a subsequent award from the Collaboration for AIDS Vaccine Discovery of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (www.cavd.org). This work was also supported in part by the Harvard University Center for AIDS Research (cfar.globalhealth.harvard.edu) grant P-30-AI060354; University of California San Francisco (UCSF) Center for AIDS Research (cfar.ucsf.edu) grant P-30 AI27763; UCSF Clinical and Translational Science Institute (https://ctsi.ucsf.edu) grant UL1 RR024131; Center for AIDS Research Network of Integrated Clinical Systems (http://cfar.globalhealth.harvard.edu) grant R24 AI067039; and the National Institutes for Health (www.nih.gov) grants AI28568 and AI030914 (B.D.W.). The AIDS Clinical Trials Group was supported by NIH grants AI069513, AI34835, AI069432, AI069423, AI069477, AI069501, AI069474, AI069428, AI69467, AI069415, Al32782, AI27661, AI25859, AI28568, AI30914, AI069495, AI069471, AI069532, AI069452, AI069450, AI069556, AI069484, AI069472, AI34853, AI069465, AI069511, AI38844, AI069424, AI069434, AI46370, AI68634, AI069502, AI069419, AI068636, RR024975, AI077505, AI110527, and TR000445 (D.W.H.). For the CASCADE Consortium, the research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union Seventh Programme (FP7/2007–2013) under EuroCoord (www.eurocoord.net) grant agreement no. 260694 (K.P.) and the Spanish Network of HIV/AIDS grant nos. RD06/006, RD12/0017/0018 and RD16CIII/0002/0006 (J.DA.). A portion of the data in this manuscript were collected by the Multicenter AIDS Cohort Study (MACS). MACS (Principal Investigators): Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health (Joseph Margolick, Todd Brown), U01-AI35042; Northwestern University (Steven Wolinsky), U01-AI35039; University of California, Los Angeles (Roger Detels, Oto Martinez-Maza, Otto Yang), U01-AI35040; University of Pittsburgh (Charles Rinaldo, Lawrence A. Kingsley, Jeremy J. Martinson), U01-AI35041; the Center for Analysis and Management of MACS, Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health (Lisa Jacobson, Gypsyamber D'Souza), UM1-AI35043. The MACS is funded primarily by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), with additional co-funding from the National Cancer Institute (NCI), the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), and the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). Targeted supplemental funding for specific projects was also provided by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), and the National Institute on Deafness and Communication Disorders (NIDCD). MACS data collection is also supported by UL1-TR001079 (JHU ICTR) from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) a component of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and NIH Roadmap for Medical Research. The contents of this publication are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Johns Hopkins ICTR, or NCATS. The MACS website is located at http://aidscohortstudy.org/ ; Sí
Background: The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) has set a "90-90-90" target to curb the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) epidemic by 2020, but methods used to assess whether countries have reached this target are not standardized, hindering comparisons. Methods: Through a collaboration formed by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) with European HIV cohorts and surveillance agencies, we constructed a standardized, 4-stage continuum of HIV care for 11 European Union countries for 2013. Stages were defined as (1) number of people living with HIV in the country by end of 2013; (2) proportion of stage 1 ever diagnosed; (3) proportion of stage 2 that ever initiated ART; and (4) proportion of stage 3 who became virally suppressed (≤200 copies/mL). Case surveillance data were used primarily to derive stages 1 (using back-calculation models) and 2, and cohort data for stages 3 and 4. Results: In 2013, 674500 people in the 11 countries were estimated to be living with HIV, ranging from 5500 to 153400 in each country. Overall HIV prevalence was 0.22% (range, 0.09%-0.36%). Overall proportions of each previous stage were 84% diagnosed, 84% on ART, and 85% virally suppressed (60% of people living with HIV). Two countries achieved ≥90% for all stages, and more than half had reached ≥90% for at least 1 stage. Conclusions: European Union countries are nearing the 90-90-90 target. Reducing the proportion undiagnosed remains the greatest barrier to achieving this target, suggesting that further efforts are needed to improve HIV testing rates. Standardizing methods to derive comparable continuums of care remains a challenge. ; This work was supported by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (contract number ECD.5661). ; Sí