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A Direct Comparison of Two Densely Sampled HIV Epidemics: The UK and Switzerland.

Ragonnet-Cronin, ML; Shilaih, M; Günthard, HF; Hodcroft, EB; Böni, J; Fearnhill, E; Dunn, D; ... Brown, AJ; + view all (2016) A Direct Comparison of Two Densely Sampled HIV Epidemics: The UK and Switzerland. Sci Rep , 6 , Article 32251. 10.1038/srep32251. Green open access

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Abstract

Phylogenetic clustering approaches can elucidate HIV transmission dynamics. Comparisons across countries are essential for evaluating public health policies. Here, we used a standardised approach to compare the UK HIV Drug Resistance Database and the Swiss HIV Cohort Study while maintaining data-protection requirements. Clusters were identified in subtype A1, B and C pol phylogenies. We generated degree distributions for each risk group and compared distributions between countries using Kolmogorov-Smirnov (KS) tests, Degree Distribution Quantification and Comparison (DDQC) and bootstrapping. We used logistic regression to predict cluster membership based on country, sampling date, risk group, ethnicity and sex. We analysed >8,000 Swiss and >30,000 UK subtype B sequences. At 4.5% genetic distance, the UK was more clustered and MSM and heterosexual degree distributions differed significantly by the KS test. The KS test is sensitive to variation in network scale, and jackknifing the UK MSM dataset to the size of the Swiss dataset removed the difference. Only heterosexuals varied based on the DDQC, due to UK male heterosexuals who clustered exclusively with MSM. Their removal eliminated this difference. In conclusion, the UK and Swiss HIV epidemics have similar underlying dynamics and observed differences in clustering are mainly due to different population sizes.

Type: Article
Title: A Direct Comparison of Two Densely Sampled HIV Epidemics: The UK and Switzerland.
Location: England
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1038/srep32251
Publisher version: http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep32251
Language: English
Additional information: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Keywords: HIV infections, Phylogeny, Viral transmission
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > Inst of Clinical Trials and Methodology
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > Inst of Clinical Trials and Methodology > MRC Clinical Trials Unit at UCL
URI: https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1522297
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