I’ve got a case of beer that says laurie doesn’t have a fucking clue what an index case even is. (before I post this and she runs off to the web, that is…although even that is doubtful as she can’t read links thrown in her face)
Fucking bigoted asshole.
That’s a case of 3"x5" cards, right, MikeG? 
That did a lot more than pin the needle on my irony meter.
That made the irony meter smoke, fizzle, and whimper as it burbled into self-destruct mode.
Why is that such a puzzle? Picture this: Straight African woman with HIV has sex with a visiting bisexual American man, bisexual American man returns home and has sex with gay American man, voila!
It’s much easier to explain how HIV could travel from the heterosexual community to the homosexual community, or vice versa, than to explain how AIDS could be the result of gay sex or drug use instead of HIV.
Then you can tell us all how it got from monkeys to humans.
You can tell us all how it got from the heterosexual community in Africa to the homosexual community in America.
Can you tell us what percentage of the spread of AIDS came from the homosexual community in this country vs. the heterosexual community?
Laurie, I’m confused, are you trying to say male homosexual activity created the HIV virus or that male homosexual activity caused the spread of the virus? The best hypothesis as to how HIV entered the human population is in Kung Fu Lola’s cite. It is a zoonose, a virus that jumped species, most likely an SIV from monkeys used as a food source in Africa. There are lots of zoonoses out there, rhinoviri(horses), influenza(ducks/swine) that jumped species when animals were domesticated and began living in close contact with humans. IIRC epidemiologists have tracked the North American HIV patient zero, I believe he was a gay flight attendant, who was very promiscuous. Virii are opportunists, they only care about replication, not eliminating “bad” people from the population. So you have a virulent zoonose and a promiscuous carrier who engages in high risk behavior before anyone knew what high risk behavior was. Epidemic in the making. But its all happenstance, not cause and effect. And before anyone jumps on me about being a closet homophobe because I didn’t immediately call Laurie names and jump on the pile, yes there are high risk groups and yes that is important from an epidemiological standpoint.
From the CDC…HIV patient demographics from the CDC
Correct me if I’m wrong (and I probably am), but isn’t there evidence that suggests that the spread of AIDS in the US male homosexual community was, in part, caused by a few men who traveled a lot, and had “a girl in any port”, so to speak?
I remember reading this once, but can’t find the source.
I thought someone said that it originated with people eating monkey meat?
(No, not THAT, you pervs!)
A quick perusal of Laurie’s posts tell me somebody needs to up the meds.
What s/he said. (Although I find it ironic that a poster named labmonkey was the one to make the point! ;))
I get the impression that Laurie has a bug in the appropriate place about gay people and those who speak in their behalf, generally, from past posts. She certainly has been no fan of mine! I confess to a lot of confusion about her stance, aside from the idea that being openly gay is evil and defending them as a Christian is sinful.
Perhaps she’d care to enlighten us?
<----fairly ignorant about AIDS but certainly no homophobe, in fact quite the opposite, I am all for equal rights.
Preamble aside, and perhaps this not being the right thread, I do have a question. What makes gay sex (if it indeed, does) more suceptible to the virus? I understand how it spreads through blood transfusions, but why is the incidence so much higher amongst gays? I’m guessing anal intercourse is more prone to blood mixing and blood is the only way to contract the disease? Is that correct?
Thanx in advance and pardon the hijack.
Red: That’s right.
public service message begins
Unprotected anal sex (between partners of the same or opposite sex) is a highly efficient means of transmitting HIV, because the linings of the anal canal are easy to tear. Unprotected vaginal sex is another easy way.
Condoms are absolutely essential for the prevention of transmission of HIV in either of these activities, and generous use of water-based lubricant will lessen tearing/pain during anal sex. (Oil-based lube destroys latex.) They even make special thicker/sturdier condoms specifically for anal sex.
Just to round it out, there have been very few cases of HIV transmission via oral sex (on a male or a female). Safe-sex precautions for this activity involve abstaining (preferably) or using a condom or dental dam if the receptive partner has sores or wounds in his/her mouth; not eating crunchy foods or flossing or brushing the teeth beforehand; and not ejaculating in the mouth. Using condoms, as gross as this is, will lessen the risk still further; they make flavoured condoms for this purpose.
/public service announcement
Anything else we can help with, just ask.
Redfury, the truth is that blood and semen do spread HIV. The lining of the colon and the vagina are thin and absorbant. That is why it is much easier for any person who is receiving sex that way to be infected. The reason why the numbers in the US are higher in the gay population is simply because we were the first community infected here. Worldwide far more heterosexuals are infected than gay men. Did you know that the lesbian population has one of the lowest percentages of HIV infection?
Just wanted to clear up this little canard.
“Patient zero” means the central patient in an epidemiological study, not the first person known to have the disease. Cases of AIDS (before it was called that) were diagnosed before the flight attendant in question, whose name was Gaetan Dugas.
Mr. Dugas was only patient zero because the CDC tracked his sexual partners via scrupulous notes that he happened to have kept, which was the initial evidence that HIV is sexually transmitted. The researchers did not suggest that he had introduced HIV to North America. It’s thought that this belief stems from sensationalism surrounding Randy Shilts’ book and movie And the Band Played On, in which Mr. Dugas appears.
(Furthermore, it’s now thought likely that few to none of Mr. Dugas’ HIV-infected sexual partners that the CDC studied were infected by him! They found them based on their having had liaisons with Mr. Dugas about a year before being diagnosed; now that the incubation period is known to be longer, it’s doubtful that they got it from him.)
Take home message: there was a “patient zero”, but he wasn’t the first person with HIV in North America, and he certainly didn’t bring it to North America.
Thank you, matt and supervenus, for laying some misconceptions to rest – interesting point about the lesbian population. For some bizarre reason (ignorance, obviously) I thought they also had a high/er incidence. I also didn’t know that worldwide stats reversed the US trend gay/hetero trend. Kind of felt quite smug/safe about the whole thing being a hetero… and a not very active old fart…shhhh!
Oh yes, one more thing if I may. Semen, by itself can carry the virus? Doesn’t that mean that once it is absorbed – any which way – it’ll autonatically infect the recipient?
Wow, Matt, color me educated. hangs head in shame all this time I was believing a UL. Damned Auerbach and Darrow…
There is a slowly growing pool of information on the dozens of strains of HIV, and the patterns of their several transmission histories. Mr. Dugas got a very bad rap, early on, because he cooperated in the CDC’s efforts to determine how the disease was transmitted. Haitian dentist got fairly badly mauled, as well.
It is not unlikely that HIV has been in the human virus pool for as much as a century, in fact. There are at least three groups of strains that represent separate zoonosis events. Transmission in Africa has been amplified by a number of cultural factors, many of them poorly understood in America. One vector amplifier overwhelms most of the rest. Air travel. During the last one hundred years air travel in Africa has gone from zero, to a very large network reaching all of the continent, and the rest of the world. The addition of war, famine, and genocide, have made it impossible to judge the prevalence of the actual disease AIDS until very recently.
The homosexual connection is a consequence of specific random chances. As Mr. Dugas himself pointed out, someone gave it to him, too. For whatever statistical reason, HIV was an undetected sexually transmitted disease more common among gay men than heterosexual men, in the United States, during the 1980’s. (When, by the way, the U. S. Government was spending zip to stop its known very rapid increase in numbers. If it had been transmitted by Baptist Ministers, I think it might have gotten more attention.) After that time, it became very much more common among injection users, both illegal, and legal. (Again because it was unidentified.)
Vertical transmission has now become a very strong factor in the third world. The gay’s might have been the culprits in the eighties, but it’s those darn kids, now. There is [“url=http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2003/09/30912072854.htm”]some hope on that front, just this past week.
Lepers were despised by some, Laurie. Do you despise them too? How about the victims of the Plague? If you catch something fatal and incurable, do you think we should hate you too?
Tris
Semen, like blood, is a major vector for HIV. I won’t say “automatically” - when it comes to transmission of disease, nothing is automatic - but introducing the semen of an HIV-positive person into your bloodstream puts you at extremely high risk of contracting HIV.
I feel I should point out that a penetrative partner in unprotected anal sex can get HIV from the receptive partner, and a man can get HIV from vaginal sex.
more evidence…of HIV entering the U.S. multiple times possibly as early as the late 60’s due to the large increase in international air travel. I vaguely recall reading an article in a popular science mag in which European researchers claimed they had identified HIV DNA sequence in the T4 pos lymphs of a sailor(?) who had died in the 50’s and may have possibly been one of the first Europeans to contract the virus…anyone know if there was any veracity to the claims, or what the hell I’m talking about…can’t remember the source…
It looks like Laurie’s decided to quit while her head’s still attatched to her shoulders.
Fucking dumbass.