HIV arrived in the US in the 1960s - Econdoms guide
|
 |
HIV arrived in the US in the 1960s |
|
|
New evidence has emerged that HIV was racing through the US population long before doctors became aware of a new devastating disease called Aids.
Researchers have reconstructed the history of the virus using the few remaining blood samples taken during the 1980s from Aids patients in New York, California and Georgia. They used a new type of statistical analysis to compare the HIV genetic sequences of the patients with more contemporary ones to estimate how fast the virus has changed and spread. The technique "looks back in time", says team member Kenneth Robbins at the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia.
The results support the idea that HIV arrived in the United States in about 1968, a long time before the first Aids cases appeared. Researchers are yet to determine how the virus arrived in the country, however.
One hypothesis suggests that Canadian air steward Gaetan Dugas - dubbed Patient Zero - unwittingly brought the disease into the US and then spread it to a substantial number of homosexual partners. The latest study, however, which includes Patient Zero's genetic sequence, fits a different scenario: that the disease entered many different times independently. Even early in the epidemic, the group found, the viruses in different cities were distinct from one another.
The Guardian
|
|
|
