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Cancers have been recognized as a major health problem in patients with HIV. The first cases reported, before the existence of the virus was proven, involved patients with immunosuppression and a history of illness characterized by fever, weight loss and/or lymphadenopathy lasting weeks of months. As the population grows older, a consequence of better and largely available treatments, the impact of non-AIDS-defining cancers (NADC) is having a greater impact on the management of HIV infected patients. Studies of different subtypes of HIV-1 in Romania show a very high prevalence of subtype F1, with values between 70% - 90% or the patients being infected with this strain. The study of HIV infected population in Romania is important for identifying particularities of the subtype F1 evolution. We conducted a prospective study on HIV positive patients under HAART treatment from the Constanta Regional Centre, for a period of eight years, between 2007-2015. All causes of new discovered cancers were recorded with the occasion of subsequent visits that are done on a regular basis. For comparison we used official data from of new diagnosed cancers from reports on health status for Constanta County for the same time period. The adjusted incidence ratio is 955.18/100000patient-years (95% CI 446.58 - 1463.75/100000 patient-years). As observed in similar studies conducted. HIV patients that undergo HAART treatment have an increased risk of all cancers significantly higher than what is observed in the general population. Considering this, better screening programs have to be developed and implemented for this population. Also, because of the suspicioned high number of HIV infected patients that are not diagnosed, a screening program for HIV should be implemented for all newly diagnosed patients with any type of malignancy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous studies have attempted to explore the origin of the F1 subtype, but the precise origin of the Romanian and South American F1 variants remains controversial. As the F1 subtype is the most frequent non-B variant among Europeans residing in Italy, the aim of this study was to estimate its phylogeography in order to reconstruct its origin and route of dispersion. The phylogeographical analyses, which were made using the Bayesian Markov Chain Monte Carlo approach and BEAST software, revealed two significant clades: the first included all of the Romanian strains together with a few Italian and four African isolates; the second encompassed all of the South American sequences and the large majority of Italian variants. By putting the African reference sequences into two discrete groups based on specific countries, phylogeographic analysis indicated that the F1 epidemic originated in Cameroon/Democratic Republic of Congo in the early 1940s, and was exported to South America 10 years later. Subsequently, the F1 virus spread to Angola and, from there, was exported to Romania in the early 1960s. It reached Italy in the 1970s from South America and Romania. The South American and Romanian variants of F1 have different African countries of origin and different temporal spreads. The South American variant seems to be characterized by multiple introduction events, whereas the Romanian strain probably spread as a result of a single entry. Two different pathways from South America and Romania led the F1 variant to Italy in the 1970s. J. Med. Virol. 86:186-192, 2014. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]