Transmission of Drug-Resistant HIV Type 1 Strains in HAART-Naive Patients: A 5-Year Retrospective Study in Sicily, Italy

The transmission of drug-resistant HIV-1 strains might compromise the efficacy of current first-line antiretroviral (ARV) regimens. Between 2004 and 2008, HIV-1 reverse transcriptase (RT) and protease (PR) genes of 108 ARVnaive Sicilian patients were amplified and sequenced to describe the prevalence of ARV resistance mutations among HAART-naive HIV-1-infected individuals. The frequency of transmitted drug resistance mutations (DRAMs) was determined by using genotypic interpretation algorithms. The proportion of HAART-naive HIV- 1-infected patients in Sicily increased from 18.4% to 23.5% during 2004–2008. Among naive patients, the overall prevalence of DRAMs was 15.7% [17/108; 95% CI: 9.4–2…