Aids

the_syco

Hi,
Sorry if this the wrong forum, but if AIDS is spread by unprotected sex, and protected sex was only invented in the last 70 or so years, why is isn't the western world have more AIDS infected people?

Just something I've been thinking about lately, and thought some of ye may know.

Gordon

Protected sex has been around for rather a while.

Condoms have been made out of animal gut and even.. stone.

http://www.avert.org/condoms.htm
I can't web-verify the stone comment yet.

GuanYin

the_syco wrote:

Hi,
Sorry if this the wrong forum, but if AIDS is spread by unprotected sex, and protected sex was only invented in the last 70 or so years, why is isn't the western world have more AIDS infected people?

Just something I've been thinking about lately, and thought some of ye may know.

Firstly, terminology - AIDS isn't spread, its not a virus or bacteria but a syndrome or a "condition". HIV is the virus that is spread that gives rise to the condition known as HIV.

Now, condoms have, as Gordon pointed out, been around since at least the 1700's ( I can't verify the Egyption use of condoms but I shall try) but they were mainly used by sailors and mostly to stave off syphilis.

That said, mainstream condom use has only come about in the last 100 years, and in Ireland maybe the last 20 (or less) and the reason we don't have more HIV cases is purely because the disease only reached man in the middle of the last century, sometime between 1930 and 1950, it is assumed it transferred from Chimps to humans, possibly through handling chimp meat (originally it was thoughtto be green monkeys, but this subsequently proved false). From there is most likely stayed local until late the 50's when the Kinshasa Highway was upgraded and it is believed it was passed along the route by travellers stopping at prostitutes along the highway, before it eventually made a break out of Africa into the rest ofthe world.

So the main reason we don't have a greater incidence is that HIV most likely hadn't made it into the industrial world before 1960.

Capt'n Midnight

One reason why HIV hasn't spread as far before is due to poorer transport. Also the incubation time is very long, up to 30 years and not everyone who becomes HIV positive develops AIDS. If you look up the statistics of sub-saharan africa you will see how long it takes to spread and how far it can. The main difference between there and here is health care, education attitudes to sex etc.

With Ebola previously the tradition in that part of Africa was for a very sick person to go into a hut, if they died the hut was burnt down. Changes in transport means an outbreak could in theory become worldwide within 48 hours. As a very rough comparision Ebola does to you in a day what AIDS does in a year, but in the past isolated groups of people died before they could infect others.

In 1918/1919 the influenza pandemic killed more than world war one and in a far shorter time scale. The highest estimate I've heard for syphilis was up to 1/3 of the population of Europe after it's supposed arrival from the new world. And black death hasn't gone away, the worst forms pnumonic can kill within 18 hours.

Tails

It is possible to acquire aids from other sources than unprotected sex, i know that much but im not sure exactly how, i was told one cause malnourishment if anybody could tell me id be most thankful, and about 1 in 10 irish people are immune from developing aids from hiv but can still transmit the disease.

Amz

Tails wrote:

It is possible to acquire aids from other sources than unprotected sex, i know that much but im not sure exactly how, i was told one cause malnourishment if anybody could tell me id be most thankful, and about 1 in 10 irish people are immune from developing aids from hiv but can still transmit the disease.

Have you any sources for your claims and statistics?

Tails

I learnt it during a lecture last year, so unless the lecturer was taking the piss i think thats about what is thought to be the statistic, it varies throughout europe while no one out side of europe is immune.(apart from european descendants)

GuanYin

erm... I think he was referring to the really badly named "AIDS immunity" that a mutation in the gene coding for the CCR5 receptor incurrs.

You have picked it slightly skewed though. About less than 1% of Europeans, with the majority of those being scandenavian (maybe 2% of scandenavians) have this mutation, which basically removes the access point of the HIV virus.

On top of that, about 2% of the world population produce a specific set of alpha-defensins which are able to stop the progress of HIV virus developing into AIDS.
I dunno where you are going with 1/10 though. Maybe 10% are carriers for the mutation?

Amz

That's what I was thinking alright.

Tails

yeah sorry said that very wrong, its about 1 in 10 who are carriers, but syke got the allele thing right, sorry bout that! but is there other ways to aquire aids?

BEAT

ok so if 2 people have the HIV virus, what determines why one person lives with HIV forever and why the other develops Aids?

John

Tails wrote:

It is possible to acquire aids from other sources than unprotected sex, i know that much but im not sure exactly how, i was told one cause malnourishment if anybody could tell me id be most thankful

Malnourishment could lead to you suffering cuts and abrasions more easily and if these occur in your mouth and you give someone oral sex, heavy kissing or whatever and they get bodily fluids carrying HIV (blood, semen, etc) then you can catch HIV. You can get it from getting a needle stick from a needle used by someone carrying HIV. Basically, if you have an open wound and it comes in contact with HIV infected fluid you have a chance at catching the virus.

Tails

BEAT wrote:

ok so if 2 people have the HIV virus, what determines why one person lives with HIV forever and why the other develops Aids?

Its got to do with mutant alleles, the wild type gene will produce a protein on the surface of our cells that the hiv virus binds to, however if the person has both mutant genes that particular protein isnt made and the virus cant attach to the cell.

Capt'n Midnight

BEAT wrote:

ok so if 2 people have the HIV virus, what determines why one person lives with HIV forever and why the other develops Aids?

IIRC the incubation period could possibly be up to 30 years for some people. So someone who is antibody positive has been exposed to the virus, but might not show symptoms for a very, very long time.

Also AIDS mutates pretty fast, a bit like the flu, so like the stock market past performance is no guarantee of future behaviour.

Kernel

the_syco wrote:

Hi,
Sorry if this the wrong forum, but if AIDS is spread by unprotected sex, and protected sex was only invented in the last 70 or so years, why is isn't the western world have more AIDS infected people?

Just something I've been thinking about lately, and thought some of ye may know.

The Illuminati/US Gov. didn't engineer the virus until the 50's/60's as part of population control for Africa.

GuanYin

Capt'n Midnight wrote:

Also AIDS mutates pretty fast, a bit like the flu, so like the stock market past performance is no guarantee of future behaviour.

I think you will find that AIDS doesn't mutate at all and is nothing like flu.

Victor

Tails wrote:

It is possible to acquire aids

You acquire HIV, not AIDS.

Tails wrote:

It is possible to acquire aids from other sources than unprotected sex

IV needles, infected blood products, open wounds ...

Tails wrote:

It is possible to acquire aids from other sources than unprotected sex, i know that much but im not sure exactly how, i was told one cause malnourishment if anybody could tell me id be most thankful

I don't know of any infection spread by malnourishment, but disease tends to find it easier to break down it's victims when they are weakened by malnourishment.

I imagine if you take any random group of healthy individuals and expose them to the same conditions as a malnourished group, the latter is almost always likely to come off worse.

Capt'n Midnight

syke wrote:

I think you will find that AIDS doesn't mutate at all and is nothing like flu.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=2370158

billy the squid wrote:

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/02/11/news/HIV.html

a scary discovery in the US. worth a read

Both Aids and flu have "variable regions" to better evade the immume system also, one vaccine doesn't cover all forms. The analogy is between the effects of the diease not the strutcure of the virus.

Poverty does cause aids, many prostitutes in parts of africa feel that having seen other people die of starvation something that might you in the future is a lesser risk than dying of hunger in the next few months.

GuanYin

Capt'n Midnight wrote:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=2370158 Both Aids and flu have "variable regions" to better evade the immume system also, one vaccine doesn't cover all forms. The analogy is between the effects of the diease not the strutcure of the virus.

Poverty does cause aids, many prostitutes in parts of africa feel that having seen other people die of starvation something that might you in the future is a lesser risk than dying of hunger in the next few months.

What has that strain of HIV got to do with whether or not AIDS can mutate or is like flu?

Do you even know what HIV is? Do you know what AIDS is?

Why don't ya go off and google them properly and then come back?

DrIndy

HIV has spread more rampantly in Africa due to poverty and a lack of barrier contraceptives. There are also cultural differences towards sex.

There are 4 main types of HIV - A to D. HIV B is the commonest in the developed world and consequently all the therapies are targetted towards that one, so people who develop AIDS or are HIV+ get good, now very effective treatment. This is not the case for the other serotypes of HIV.

Condoms are readily available and people are well educated on the risks. The Gay Mens Health Project do fantastic work in reducing the spread amongst homosexual men, rendering heterosexuals the higher risk group.

The other big groups are people who receive blood products, IV drug users and health care workers (needle sticks).

Remember that HIV is a REALLY fragile virus that falls apart just by looking at it and it takes a lot of effort to get infected.

The problem with the vaccine is the first one doesn't really work and also remember there are 4 serotypes and just because one works in the western world is no guarrantee it will work in Africa where it is really needed.

Capt'n Midnight

Remember all those donations Bill Gates was giving...
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/213232_microsofthiv23.html

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