Immunology

P.A. Volberding, S.W. Lagakos, M.A. Koch, C. Pettinelli, et al., "Zidovudine in asymptomatic human immunodeficiency virus infection: a controlled trial in persons with fewer than 500 CD4-positive cells per cubic millimeter," The New England Journal of Medicine, 322, 941-9, 5 April 1990.

Paul A. Volberding (AIDS Program, San Francisco General Hospital, Calif.): "Establishing a medical intervention for patients with HIV infection who remain asymptomatic has changed our basic concept of this large group of patients. The possibility of offering treatment to patients with asymptomatic infection in a sense defines them as having a disease and adds a powerful support to arguments to encourage the more widespread use of voluntary HIV testing. This, in fact, may be as important as the specific observation in this study that zidovudine can reduce the progression rate of HIV disease in patients who are infected and asymptomatic with fewer than 500 CD4+ cells per cubic...