Objectives
The correlation of immune activation with CD4+ depletion and HIV-1 disease progression has been evidenced by several studies involving mainly clade B virus. However, this
needs to be investigated in developing countries such as India predominately infected with clade C virus.
Materials and methods
In a cross-sectional study of 68 antiretroviral treatment naïve, HIV-1 infected Indian patients, we studied the association
between CD4+ T cells, plasma HIV-1 RNA levels, and immune activation markers using unadjusted and adjusted correlative analyses.
Results
Significant negative correlations of higher magnitude were observed between the CD4+ T cell percentages and plasma HIV-1 RNA levels in the study population when adjusted for the effects of immune activation
markers. However, the negative association of CD4+ T cells with immune activation markers remained unaffected when controlled for the effects of plasma HIV-1 RNA levels.
Conclusions
Our results support the important role of immune activation in CD4+ T cell depletion and disease progression during untreated HIV-1 infection.