Effect of a previous history of antiretroviral treatment on the clinical picture of patients with co-infection of SARS-CoV-2 and HIV: A preliminary study

Abstract

Objectives: We explored the effect of antiretroviral treatment (ART) history on clinical characteristics of patients with SARS-CoV-2 and HIV co-infection. Methods: We retrospectively reviewed 20 patients with laboratory-confirmed co-infection of SARS-CoV-2 and HIV in a designated hospital. Patients were divided into medicine (n = 12) and non-medicine (n = 8) groups according to previous ART history before SARS-CoV-2 infection. Results: The median age was 46.5 years and 15 (75%) were female. Ten patients had initial negative RT-PCR on admission, five of which had normal computed tomography (CT) appearance and four were asymptomatic. Lymphocytes were low in nine patients (45%); CD4 cell count and CD4/CD8 were low in all patients. The predominant CT features in 19 patients were multiple (42%) ground-glass opacities (58%) and consolidations (32%). Erythrocyte sedimentation rate was significantly lower in the medicine than the non-medicine group [median (interquartile range, IQR): 14.0 (10.0–34.0) vs 51.0 (35.8–62.0), P = 0.005]. Nineteen patients (95%) were discharged with a median hospital stay of 30 days (IQR 26–30). Conclusions: Most patients with SARS-CoV-2 and HIV co-infection exhibited mild to moderate symptoms. The milder inflammatory response to SARS-CoV-2 infection might be associated with a previous history of ART in HIV-infected patients.

Keywords

• Coronavirus disease 2019
• HIV
• Antiretroviral therapy
• Characteristics
• Reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction
• Serum antibodies