Prevalence of CCR5 and CCR2 HIV-coreceptor gene polymorphisms in Belgium

Polymorphisms of the chemokine receptor genes CCR5 and CCR2 are associated with resistance to HIV-1 infection or delayed progression to AIDS. Few data are available on their combined prevalence in healthy subjects; we therefore examined the occurrence of CCR5-Delta32 and CCR2-64I polymorphisms in a sample of 310 healthy Belgians. Allele frequencies were 0.119 and 0.074 for CCR5-Delta32 and CCR2-64I, respectively. Genotype distributions for both polymorphisms were found to be in accordance with Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium, but a significant (p = 0.002) linkage disequilibrium between CCR5-Delta32 and CCR2-64I was observed. The high prevalence of CCR5-Delta32 and CCR2-64I in Belgians may need to be taken into account in the design of studies of antiretroviral treatments.