are PCR positive and/or leishmanial antibody positive become infected with L. infantum. Persons with advanced AIDS or other immunosuppressive conditions seemingly would be at greatest risk for VL. In Brazil, legislation requires that all blood for transfusion be tested for T. cruzi ., hepatitis B and C, T. pallidum, human T-cell lymphotropic virus types 1 and 2, and HIV1 and -2. As additional i...

BACKGROUND Retroviruses of human T-lymphotropic viruses (HTLV-1 and HTLV-2) have been demonstrated to be endemic in the north-eastern region of Iran. This study was aimed to determine the HTLV-1 and HTLV-2 prevalence among healthy individuals in Neyshabur City during 2010-2014. METHODS A total of 8054 blood samples were collected from healthy participants in Neyshabur, North-Eastern Iran. The...

INTRODUCTION This study investigated the occurrence of Strongyloides stercoralis infestation and coinfection with HTLV-1/2 in Belém, Brazil. METHODS S. stercoralis was investigated in stool samples obtained from individuals infected with HTLV-1/2 and their uninfected relatives. RESULTS The frequency of S. stercoralis was 9% (9/100), including six patients infected with HTLV-1 (14.3%), two p...

Human T-cell lymphotropic virus (HTLV) may impact the clinical course of tuberculosis (TB). Both infections are highly endemic in Brazil. The aim of this study was to assess the prevalence of HTLV-1/2 in TB patients in Central-West Brazil and to perform a genetic characterisation of the respective isolates. Of the 402 patients, six (1.49%) were positive for anti-HTLV and five (1.24%; 95% confid...

When the human T cell lymphotropic virus (HTLV) is integrated with the host cell genome (provirus), its proviral DNA is a replication marker. Proviral load appears to be an important factor in the development of diseases related to these retroviruses. In this study, a methodology for absolute quantification of the HTLV-1 and HTLV-2 proviral load using real-time PCR was developed. Fifty-three bl...

The susceptibility to Fas-mediated apoptosis was evaluated in seven T-cell lines (two infected with HTLV-2, one with HTLV-1, and four HTLV-free) as well as in Jurkat cells transfected with a Tax-2 expressing vector. Fas-mediated apoptosis was significantly reduced in the HTLV-1- and HTLV-2-infected lines in comparison with the HTLV-free lines regardless of the surface expression of Fas antigen ...

Human T-lymphotropic virus type I (HTLV-I), a causative agent of adult T-cell leukemia, (ATL) is transmitted from mother to child. ATL cells originate from the CD4 subset of peripheral T cells. The main route of mother-to-child transmission is postnatal breast-feeding. Refraining from breast-feeding or limiting the duration of breast-feeding can reduce the risk of mother-to-child transmission. ...

The human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) laboratory strains adapted to T-cell lines, as well as most syncytium-inducing primary isolates, replicate poorly in macrophages, which, beside CD4(+) T lymphocytes, are major targets of HIV-1. In the present work, we used a semiquantitative PCR-based technique to study viral entry into cells, kinetics of reverse transcription, and translocation o...

Introduction The discovery in 1980 of the first human retrovirus (1), the human T-lymphotropic virus type 1 (HTLV-I), inaugurated a new era in human pathology. Two conditions were promptly associated with this retroviral infection (2): adult T-cell leukemia/lymphoma (ATLL) and tropical spastic paraparesis (TSP). Thus, this discovery solved a longlasting enigma in tropical medicine, the cause of...