The History of AIDS

Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, aka AIDS - A severe immunological disorder caused by the retrovirus HIV, resulting in a defect in cell-mediated immune response that is manifested by increased susceptibility to opportunistic infections and to certain rare cancers, especially Kaposi's sarcoma. It is transmitted primarily by exposure to contaminated body fluids, especially blood and semen.

In the year 1980, a San Francisco resident by the name of Ken Horne was the first AIDS patient to be recognized in the United States.  He was reported at the Center for Disease Control and Prevention with what is known as Kaposi’s sarcoma, along with Cyptococcus.  Although AIDS has been around since the 1930’s, this was the official mark of a pandemic that would sweep across the country, then across the entire world. 

Horne died a year later.

“ In And the Band Played On, Randy Shilts chronicles the suffering and death of Ken Horne, the first AIDS patient reported to the Center for Disease Control (CDC) in Atlanta in 1980: “His once-toned dancer’s body had shrunk to 122 pounds, and his fever constantly ran at 102 degrees. He was blind now, too, from the CMV [cytomegalovirus] herpes infections that had wasted his nervous system. His mind also seemed to be going, like that of an old person suffering from dementia” ~The International Socialist Review.

Ken Horne was a homosexual, but didn’t contract the new virus known as AIDS through sexual intercourse.  AIDS can be transmitted, not only through any sexual intercourse, but it can be “passed on” through semen, vaginal secretions, and blood.  Blood was the most common for the transfer of AIDS because of blood transfusions, which is how he contracted AIDS: Through blood of someone else that was already infected that didn’t seek medical treatment.

Despite what the community may think, homosexuals are not the only ones that can contract AIDS.  Homosexuals ARE MORE LIKELY, because they can be more promiscuous.  This is how AIDS became the pandemic that we are so desperately trying to defeat today. 

Fortunately, when the first marker of AIDS went to the public and how it one can contracted, the homosexual community started (slowly) to decrease the number of the sexual partners they had.  This made the male homosexual community decrease more than the female community because society believed that only men were gay. At the time, people believed that they could contract this disease by contact from anyone that has this disease (and that goes back to the homosexual community; people believing that only homosexuals had this disease, which is not true).

Back when drugs started to get popular, people were looking for a new, better, quicker way to get high.  One of the quickest ways is through an injection because it hits your bloodstream faster than it does with pills.  When more and more people started to inject drugs into their bloodstream, they would share needles, and on the needles were little drops of blood, and in the blood contained the virus AIDS. 

Even though the proof was there, the US government did not react until 2001, and by then, the number of people infected with AIDS was up to 40 million, and that is only counting the people who got diagnosed. The death toll is not available because the UNAIDS (The Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS) stopped counting shortly after 2001.  The United States contributed $10 million, but the research facilities only received 2 million dollars.  Several people marched around with banners demanding “Where is the $10 million?!”

Finding a cure for AIDS has not been found, but there are medications to help live with this syndrome.  One of the major steps that could be taken to help prevent AIDS is:

If you are sexually active, get a regular exam to make sure that you haven’t contracted the virus.
Once when you feel the symptoms, go to the doctor and see if you do have this virus.
If you do, tell your partner(s) (or anyone else you have had sexual intercourse with) so that he/she can be tested to see if they are positive for this virus.

The second step will help find a cure for AIDS because, when the doctors know how many people are infected, they can get separate strains that are completely different from one another and test new medicines on these strains. 

A way to cure this syndrome in the baby boomer’s lifetime is to practice prevention.  That is one of the prime ways to prevent from contracting AIDS, and you will also live a healthier, more fulfilling life.  If you do have HIV/AIDS, do not have any sort of sexual intercourse so that you do not spread this syndrome.