Interleukin-2 enhances production in 24 hours of infectious human immunodeficiency virus type 1 in vitro by naturally infected mononuclear cells from seropositive donors.

When peripheral blood mononuclear cells from HIV-1 seropositive patients were treated with rIL-2 in vitro a rapid increase of 2-12 fold in production of extracellular infectious HIV-1 occurred, in 6 of 9 experiments. Overall, the increase in the 9 experiments was significant (p less than 0.01) and provides more direct evidence for an enhancing role of IL-2 in naturally infected cells.