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A rare type of group N HIV has been discovered in France
Medical expert of the article
Last reviewed: 01.07.2025
A man from France who recently travelled to Togo has been diagnosed with a rare type of HIV infection called Group N. This is the first time this type of HIV has been detected outside Cameroon. Group N HIV is very similar to the virus found in chimpanzees.
Professor François Simon from the Saint-Louis Hospital in Paris and his team from the National HIV Centre in Rouen, France, described this rare case in the journal Lancet.
In Europe, the most common HIV group is M, or, less commonly, O. The first person diagnosed with HIV group N was a woman from Cameroon in 1998. Since then, only 12 cases of HIV group N have been diagnosed, all in Cameroon. In 2009, a fourth group of the immunodeficiency virus (group P) was identified, found in a Cameroonian woman living in Paris.
Eight days after returning from Togo, a 57-year-old man living in France presented to the emergency department of the Saint-Louis hospital complaining of a rash, fever, genital ulcers and swollen lymph nodes. After learning of the patient's sexual contact with a Togolese partner, doctors suspected HIV infection. After conducting an HIV test, scientists were shocked to find that the virus did not match the standard types of HIV common in France.
The authors explain that the N group type of HIV infection is particularly dangerous due to severe clinical manifestations and an early decrease in the number of CD4 lymphocytes.
Antiretroviral therapy in combination with five drugs has demonstrated good treatment efficacy, although scientists need further long-term virological and immunological studies.
This reported case of HIV-N indicates that there is now a spread of a rare strain of HIV infection beyond Cameroon into Europe, highlighting the need for careful epidemiological monitoring of HIV infection.
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