Epidemiological Features of HIV Infection and Molecular Genetic Characteristics of HIV-1 Circulating in the Magadan Region

Introduction: HIV infection remains one of the major public health problems worldwide. Since the high genetic diversity of HIV and the formation of resistance to antiretroviral drugs have a negative impact on achieving the goal of eradicating the infection, it is important to monitor circulating HIV-1 variants on different territories on a regular basis. Objective: To conduct an epidemiological and molecular genetics analysis of HIV-1 variants circulating in the Magadan Region, including the analysis of drug resistance mutations. Materials and methods: HIV infection rates were analyzed based on data provided by the Center for AIDS Control and Prevention in the Magadan Region and information from the Federal State Statistics Service for 2019–2024. Molecular genetics testing was performed for 39 blood plasma samples using Sanger sequencing of fragments of the pol gene encoding the protease and part of the HIV-1 reverse transcriptase. Results: HIV-1 sub-subtype A6 prevailed in the examined group (87.2 %). We detected two imported cases of subtype B infection (5.1 %) and the recombinant of CRF63_02A6 in three cases (7.7 %). Mutations associated with the development of antiretroviral drug resistance were found in 1 of 14 untreated patients (7.1 %) and in 8 of 25 patients (32.0 %) undergoing therapy. Conclusion: The results highlight the importance of widespread introduction of modern molecular genetics methods (sequencing, phylogenetic analysis, and bioinformatic techniques) into the HIV surveillance system in certain territories of the Russian Federation.