SWEAT FROM HIV-INFECTED PEOPLE IS SAFE.

Human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) has been isolated from a variety of body fluids, ranging from saliva to breast milk. Yet no previously reported studies have looked for HIV-1 in human sweat.

These investigators collected eccrine sweat and peripheral blood samples from 50 HIV-1-seropositive subjects and two HIV-negative controls. (The sweat was taken from the forearms while subjects were in a warm, humid room.) In addition to cultures of blood and sweat, the authors performed the highly sensitive polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay on sweat from 39 HIV-1-positive patients and one control patient to detect HIV-1 RNA and proviral DNA.

HIV-1 was cultured from the mononuclear cells of 39 (78 percent) of the 50 HIV-positive patients, b…