‘Dormant’ HIV has ongoing skirmishes with the body’s immune system
In people on HIV drugs, the virus may still exhaust T cells, making it hard to fight back
In this image, HIV particles (yellow) replicate from an infected T cell (pink). In people taking antiretroviral medications, infected cells still shed bits of virus that immune system can detect. The discovery overturns a decades-old idea that the viral reservoir was largely quiescent, not affecting the immune system.