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Health

Is the HIV virus evolving weaknesses?

By Rowan Hooper

28 September 2005

HIV is one of the best studied organisms in history, yet there is still much we have to learn about it. And one of the big unknowns is how the virus is changing as it spreads through the human population.

Research published this week suggests that it may be evolving to become less virulent. But how that will affect the progress of the HIV pandemic, or the number of people who will be killed by AIDS, remains almost impossible to say.

Kevin AriĆ«n of the HIV and retroviral research unit at the Institute of Tropical Medicine in Antwerp, Belgium, and…

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