COVID-19 in patients with HIV: case-series

Abstract

The article presents a series of clinical observations of confirmed cases of COVID-19 in hospitalized adult patients with HIV infection. The observed group of patients was characterized by a young age, a different spectrum of comorbid pathology, a moderate and comparable clinical and laboratory course, with the exception of a more prolonged clearance of SARS-CoV-2 compared with COVID-19 patients from the general population. Advanced stage of HIV infection with the development of secondary diseases (p=0.08), decrease in the relative number of CD4+T-lymphocytes less than 2% (p=0.03), and CD4+/CD8+ less than 0.05 (p=0.03), the presence of cytomegalovirus infection (p=0.004) distinguished HIV-SARS-CoV-2-coinfected patients with poor outcomes. The presence and similarity of the clinical and radiological course of COVID-19 and cytomegalovirus infection in patients with severe immunodeficiency was noted, which requires an extremely thorough differential diagnosis.