PREVALENCE OF HIV-INFECTIONS AMONG PATIENTS ATTENDING A PARISIAN ANONYMOUS TESTING CENTER BETWEEN 1988 AND 1993

The prevalence of HIV infection was assessed among 15,611 consecutive patients attending a Parisian anonymous testing center from April 1988 to June 1993. Sera (17,910) were tested for the presence of anti-HIV antibodies using two different enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays. Ser opositivity was verified by Western blotting. The sera were also assay ed for HIV antigenemia detection in 2,493 cases. Six hundred and seven ty-seven patients were found to be anti-HIV antibody positive : among them 666 were infected by HIV-1 and only 11 by HIV-2. Antigenemia was detected in 108 samples (4.3 %). In all cases but 5, antigenemia was a ssociated with the presence of specific antibodies. Risk factors for H IV infection could be determined for 5,735 patients. The HIV prevalenc e rates were 5.2 % in 1988-89, 4.9 % in 1990, 3.4 % in 1991, 2.8 % in 1992 and 1.8 % for the 6 first months of 1993 (p < 0.01). Only one pat ient was coinfected with HTLV-1. This study shows a trend of decreasin g seropositivity rates among the patients attending the anonymous test ing center since 1990. By contrast, the percentage of seropositive pat ients with antigenemia was stable between 1988 and 1993.