Source: Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome
Published November 2, 2017
A new article in the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome entitled “Network Viral Load: A Critical Metric for HIV Elimination” was released in November looking at a more precise measure of HIV infection risk among high-risk individuals in Chicago, IL.
Associations have been observed between an aggregate viral load measure, the community viral load (CVL) and new HIV diagnoses. The CVL aggregates viral loads within chosen geographic areas, restricting inferences about HIV acquisition risk to these areas. Researchers developed a more precise metric, the Network Viral Load (NVL), to measure the composite viral load within a risk network of an HIV negative individual and found a positive association between NVL and HIV seroprevalence.
While limited in its ability to infer causality, NVL could have substantial public health implications for persons most at risk for HIV infection.