HIV-1 Integrase Resistance among Highly Antiretroviral Experienced Patients from Morocco.

Background: We aimed to analyze for the first time in Morocco the integrase (IN) sequence variability among highly experienced HIV-1-infected patients with no prior IN strand transfer inhibitor (INSTI) exposure who failed on reverse transcriptase inhibitors and protease inhibitors.

Methods: The HIV-1 IN region was sequenced from plasma samples of all 78 recruited patients. The amino acid IN sequences were HIV-1 subtyped and screened for the presence of polymorphisms against the HxB2 clade B consensus sequence by the geno2pheno subtyping tool and interpreted for drug resistance according to the Stanford algorithm.

Results: The viral subtypes were subtype B (88.4%), CRF02_AG (8.9%), CRF01_AE (1.28%), and subtype C (1.28%). The major INSTI resistance mutations at positions 66, 92, 118, 138, 140, 143, 147, 148, 155, and 263 were absent, while two accessory mutations, L74M/I, known to have no clinical impact to INSTIs in the absence of the major resistance mutations, were detected in three samples (3.84%; two CRF02_AG and one CRF01_AE). Others specific substitutions with an uncertain role on the HIV-1 susceptibility to INSTIs at positions 72, 101, 119, 124, 156, 165, 193, 201, 203, 206, 230, 232, and 249 were found to be relatively common.

Conclusion: This study demonstrated that INSTIs should be an excellent alternative for salvage therapy in highly experienced patients with multidrug resistant viruses in Morocco.