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News of the Day ... In Perspective04/02/2006Influenza vaccine may give false positive HIV screen A letter to the New England Journal of Medicine reports on a man who had a repeatedly positive immunoassay for HIV type 1 and an indeterminate Western blot after an occupational needle-stick injury. An HIV nucleic acid amplification test was repeatedly negative, and the Western blot reverted to negative. The patient�s medical history was notable only for having received an influenza vaccine 11 days before presentation. The author calls for increased awareness of this previously recognized cross-reactivity of various influenza strains. The time course is unknown (Erickson CP. N Engl J Med 2006;354:1422-1423). More than 15 years ago, blood donation centers reported false positivity on screens for HIV-1, HTLV-1, and hepatitis C virus in donors that had received any brand of influenza vaccine. The test kits were implicated in that study. Duration of false positivity was 3 to 6 months (Simonsen L, et al. Am J Epidemiol 1995;141:1089-1096). Additional information:
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