In the first six months after infection HIV viral loads tend to be elevated and people are more often symptomatic than in later latent phases of HIV disease. There may be special benefits to starting antiretroviral therapy early during this acute phase, including lowering the viral "set-point" or baseline viral load, reduce the mutation rate of the virus, and reduce the size of the viral reservoir (See section below on viral reservoirs). The SPARTAC trial compared 48 weeks of ART vs 12 weeks vs no treatment in acute HIV infection and found that 48 weeks of treatment delayed the time to decline in CD4 count below 350 cells per ml by 65 weeks and kept viral loads significantly lower even after treatment was stopped.