Gay concern over hyping AIDS 'superbug'

[Bluebear]

NEW YORK (AFP) - Gay activists fear the announcement of a rare, highly virulent strain of the AIDS virus being found in a New York man may fuel panic of an HIV "superbug" and further stigmatise their community.

New York City health officials said last week that the strain, known as 3-DCR HIV, was unresponsive to three types of anti-retroviral medications and greatly accelerated the transition from infection to full-blown AIDS. The virus was diagnosed in a man in his late 40s who reported having unprotected sex with multiple male partners, often while using the highly potent narcotic crystal methamphetamine.

Some gay activists and AIDS specialists believe the New York Health Department jumped the gun with its announcement, arguing that a lot more research was required to determine the precise nature of the virus strain in question.

"Those who practice good science would have waited," said Martin Delaney, founder director of Project Inform, one of the oldest US non-profit AIDS organisations. "They would have shared and discussed the date with scientific peers and then -- most importantly -- they would have gone back to the labs and followed up on the patient for another six months before drawing any hard conclusions," he said.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1508&ncid=1508&e=6&u=/afp/20050216/hl_afp/ushealthaids

[CindyDale]

1. Sorry, but it's not ethical to hold back info that might save someone's

life whether or not it has been scientifically confirmed. Sometimes you have to go with the anecdotal information.

How many people might be alive today if the original AIDS cases had gotten into the media in time? Even doctors didn't hear about them for a long time.

[Bluebear]

2. I'm sorry too, but resistant virus is not a 'new' phenomenon

I ran into this comment the day the story came out, by a noted HIV doctor:

http://qa.hopkins-aids.edu/forum/view_question.html?section_id=61&id=104149&category_id=0

I'm a little surprised that this is being talked about as something new. We've known for years that you can be infected by resistant virus, and there have been cases described in which people have been infected by virus that's essentially resistant to all drugs. The difference here is that this patient progressed to AIDS very rapidly. I haven't seen all the details of the story, but I doubt that we can be sure that his rapid progression was a definite consequence of the resistance of the virus. In many cases, people who progress rapidly do so because of their own genetics rather than due to characteristics of the virus. In addition, by talking about a new "strain" of the virus, the implication is that the virus being transmitted in the community is evolving en masse, which is not the case. This unfortunate individual was in the wrong place at the wrong time (or moe likely in many wrong places many, many times) and picked up a resistant virus from someone who had developed highly resistant virus as a result of therapy. It doesn't mean that the standard wild-type virus out there today is worse than it was 10 years ago.

===

It's a very scary story but you have to look into all aspects of it.

[CindyDale]

3. Dr. David Ho was a witness to the first cases of AIDS, which the media

ignored in the 1980s. It took way too long for it to get into the media, and even when it was finally reported hardly anyone paid attention for a long time.

So that is probably why when Dr. Ho announced this the media reported it.

[Bluebear]

4. When the disease first came out it was the 'gay plague'

and other lovely acronyms. One reason it was not reported widely is that is only affected a few gay men. Reagan ignored it for a long time. I didn't write this news article that I cited, there has been discussion in this particular group about it and it is a topic of interest.

[xchrom]

5. i've known people

who don't respond to the aids treatments available.
resistant strains are NOT new.

people with hiv/aids are still dying while on the various cocktails -- the virus is always mutating.

what's important here is tackling the meth epidemic -- and stop lumping gay folk into groups.