Item #50: Does HIV Kill T-Cells?

It is claimed that although HIV does not kill the laboratory T-cells used to manufacture AIDS tests, it does kill T-cells in the human body, even though it infects only a very small proportion of them, typically an average of 0.1 percent.

Farber further states in footnote 13 "It is claimed that although HIV does not kill the laboratory T-cells used to manufacture AIDS tests, it does kill T-cells in the human body, even though it infects only a very small proportion of them, typically an average of 0.1 percent".

There are three inaccuracies in this sentence. First, HIV does kill T-cells in the laboratory, as was recorded in the very earliest papers on the isolation of HIV dating from 1983-1984. Second, "laboratory T-cells" have not been used to "manufacture AIDS tests" for many years now (the technology has evolved well beyond the early methods of the mid-1980's which were based on the production of inactivated HIV particles in permanent T-cell lines that had been carefully selected for relative resistance to the cell-killing effects of HIV). Third, HIV does directly kill, or otherwise cause the death of a substantial fraction of the total CD4+ T-cell complement of the body. Farber is presumably alluding to measurements of the HIV infection status of CD4+ T-cells present in the bloodstream, which constitute only a small proportion of the total amount of these cells present in the body as a whole. Most CD4+ T-cells cells are, in fact, located in solid lymphoid tissues, particularly in the gut-associated lymphoid tissue. The loss of CD4+ T-cells from such tissues upon HIV infection is rapid in rate and substantial in extent.77

Until recently, prevailing dogma said HIV causes AIDS by killing T-cells. Most people, including Robert Gallo, still adhere to this belief even though there is no evidence to support it. On the contrary, the wealth of evidence available clearly shows that HIV does not, in fact, kill T-cells. This is not surprising since the hallmark of retroviruses (HIV included) is that they do not kill cells [1, 2].

The discoverer of HIV, Luc Montagnier, heads [3] a list [4-6] of virologists who have confirmed that HIV does not kill T-cells in culture. Neither does it kill T-cells in human beings. Mario Roederer of Stanford University said in an editorial in 1998 [7] that the results of Pakker et al. [8] and Gorochov et al. [9] “provide the final nails in the coffin for models of T cell dynamics in which a major reason for changes in T cell numbers is the death of HIV-infected cells.”

Roederer went on to conclude that, “The facts (1) that HIV uses CD4 as it primary receptor, and (2) that CD4+ T cell numbers decline during AIDS, are only an unfortunate coincidence that have led us astray from understanding the immunopathogenesis of this disease.” See references [10, 11] for additional evidence that HIV does not kill T-cells in people.

The fact that HIV does not kill T-cells has caused a remarkable about-face in mainstream thinking. Commenting on a recent paper by Hellerstein et al. [12], Guido Silvestri and Mark Feinberg summarized in 2003 the latest speculation that HIV causes AIDS not by killing T-cells but by over-stimulating the immune system [13]. Silvestri and Feinberg inform us that, “Prevailing views…have shifted from models that focus primarily on direct HIV-mediated killing of CD4+ T cells to models that emphasize the pathogenic role of generalized immune system activation.” In other words, HIV no longer causes AIDS by killing our immune cells, as Gallo contends, but by boosting our immune system.

1. Rubin H, Temin H. A radiological study of cell-virus interaction in the Rous sarcoma. Virology 1958,7:75-91.

2. Weiss R, Teich N, Varmus H, Coffin J. Molecular Biology of RNA Tumor Viruses. Plainview, NY: Cold Spring Harbor Lab. Press; 1985.

3. Lemaitre M, Guetard D, Henin Y, Montagnier L, Zerial A. Protective activity of tetracycline analogs against the cytopathic effect of the human immunodeficiency viruses in CEM cells. Res Virol 1990,141:5-16.

4. Langhoff E, McElrath J, Bos HJ, et al. Most CD4+ T cells from human immunodeficiency virus-1 infected patients can undergo prolonged clonal expansion. J Clin Invest 1989,84:1637-1643.

5. Anand R, Reed C, Forlenza S, Siegal F, Cheung T, Moore J. Non-cytocidal natural variants of human immunodeficiency virus isolated from AIDS patients with neurological disorders. Lancet 1987,2:234-238.

6. Hoxie JA, Haggarty BS, Rakowski JL, Pillsbury N, Levy JA. Persistent noncytopathic infection of normal human T lymphocytes with AIDS-associated retrovirus. Science 1985,229:1400-1402.

7. Roederer M. Getting to the HAART of T cell dynamics. Nature Medicine 1998,4:145-146.

8. Pakker NG, et al. Biphasic kinetics of peripheral blood T cells after triple combination therapy in HIV-1 infection: a composite of redistribution and proliferation. Nature Medicine 1998,4:208-214.

9. Gorochov G, et al. Perturbation of CD4+ and CD8+ T-cell repertories during progression to AIDS and regulation of the CD4+ repertoire during antiviral therapy. Nature Medicine 1998,4:215-221.

10. Grossman Z, Herberman RB. T-cell homeostasis in HIV infection is neither failing nor blind: modified cell counts reflect an adaptive response of the host [see comments]. Nat Med 1997,3:486-490.

11. Hellerstein M, Hanley MB, Cesar D, et al. Directly measured kinetics of circulating T lymphocytes in normal and HIV-1-infected humans [see comments]. Nat Med 1999,5:83-89.

12. Hellerstein MK, Hoh RA, Hanley MB, et al. Subpopulations of long-lived and short-lived T cells in advanced HIV-1 infection. J Clin Invest 2003,112:956-966.

13. Silvestri G, Feinberg MB. Turnover of lymphocytes and conceptual paradigms in HIV infection. J Clin Invest 2003,112:821-824.