To circumvent the challenge of ascertaining RNA expression in infected cells with waning levels of housekeeping genes, real-time PCR was performed using primers specific for the cPMLΔ5&6 transcripts along with primers that recognize all PML isoforms (primers derived from exon 3) to compare the expression of cPMLΔ5&6 to total PML transcripts during viral infection. This evidence concerns the gene PML and viral infectious disease.