Faculty Bibliography

The discoveries arose from studies undertaken out of concern that another retrovirus could emerge to mushroom into another global pandemic like AIDS. Many scientists say they believe that H.I.V., the AIDS virus, mutated from a simian virus that was transmitted from nonhuman primates to hunters and then spread widely through sex and contaminated needles. The retroviruses, named H.T.L.V.-3 and H.T.L.V.-4, for human T-lymphotropic virus, are the newest members of a class that can cause a wide spectrum of illnesses. The retrovirus numbered 1 is a cause of leukemia and inflammatory diseases, and it and H.T.L.V.-2 can lead to neurological disease, Dr. [Walid Heneine] said. Although the ultimate aim is to prevent another virus from causing an AIDS-like pandemic, Dr. Heneine said, one concern is the potential spread of the new viruses through blood transfusions. Blood banks in Africa do not test for H.T.L.V. viruses before blood and blood products are transfused, he said

Health officials around the world have pointed to Uganda's success in reducing the prevalence of infections with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, in recent years. Uganda's President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni, the [BUSH] administration and some public health experts have credited the decline largely to a policy known as ABC -- for abstinence, be faithful (monogamy) and condom use. The findings apply strictly to Rakai and cannot be extrapolated to other areas of Uganda for many reasons, [Maria J. Wawer] and a co-author, Dr. Ronald Gray of Johns Hopkins, who is also her husband, said in interviews with reporters. One reason is that the age of first sexual intercourse varies in different areas of Uganda. [Chris Beyrer], Wawer and Gray said there now is a condom shortage in Uganda because officials have found defects in condoms imported from a country they did not identify. The Ugandan government has stopped distribution of condoms imported from that country and is testing all foreign-made condoms, including those made in the United States, they said, adding that the price of condoms in Uganda has risen

Charles King, the president of Housing Works, an AIDS support group, said the announcement could be used to demonize the gay lifestyle and accused Dr. [Thomas R. Frieden] of having wanted to change regulations regarding H.I.V. testing for a long time. The Community H.I.V./AIDS Mobilization Project, based in New York, said the link between the spread of the possible new strain and the use of crystal methamphetamine was unproven, and suggested that the city had ignored the ''underlying issues'' behind the spread of the virus, like discrimination, poor housing and unemployment. Dr. Ho, then a relatively unknown 37-year-old researcher fresh from Harvard and U.C.L.A., was hired to run the center in 1989 and immediately attracted attention. With more money at his disposal than most other research institutions, Dr. Ho became the object of envy as top-flight scientists lined up to join his center. Within a few years, Dr. Ho's team won international publicity, challenging long-held theories about AIDS and reporting new evidence about the way the AIDS virus works in the body. After Dr. Frieden disclosed the case, reports of similar cases quickly emerged, some of which had been published earlier. For example, Dr. Julio Montaner, a professor of medicine at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, reported in 2003 in the scientific journal AIDS that two men with a highly drug-resistant strain of H.I.V. might have progressed rapidly to AIDS. Dr. Ho did not contact Dr. Montaner about the case until three days after Dr. Frieden's news conference

Dr. Guthrie S. Birkhead, director of the New York State Health Department's AIDS Institute, said he discussed the measure with Dr. [Thomas R. Frieden] and was open to considering changing state law. However, Dr. Birkhead and Dr. Frieden said they recognized that because laboratories do not use a standard format to report test results, collecting the data could prove extremely difficult. Immediately after the rare H.I.V. strain was reported to the department, Dr. Frieden said he asked the dozen or so laboratories licensed by the state to check their records for any other patients with the same strain of the virus. While proposals to restructure the AIDS bureau have been in the planning stages for months, they gained added urgency after the city announced last week that a strain of H.I.V. had been found that showed resistance to multiple drugs and possibly led to the rapid onset of AIDS in a New York City man, perhaps in as few as two months

Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, the commissioner of the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, faced that conundrum last Friday. At a news conference, Dr. Frieden announced that a New York City man in his mid-40's had the first diagnosed strain of H.I.V. that showed both resistance to multiple classes of antiretroviral drugs and a rapid progression from infection to AIDS. Doctors have in the past reported each of these components separately, but not in combination. He said that AIDS and H.I.V. had been viewed as a cause by advocacy groups and as a scientific challenge by researchers, and that that was appropriate. ''But we really have not applied the principles of epidemic control to H.I.V./AIDS to a remarkably great extent because of the population and the political context in which it arose,'' Dr. Frieden said. In alerting medical workers, Dr. Frieden said his hope was that more infected people would be found in the early stages of H.I.V. infection. It is at that time when the risk of transmission of the virus is extremely great because there are large amounts of H.I.V. in the blood. Also, Dr. Frieden said, most people change their risk behavior upon learning that they are infected

Tests in [David Ho]'s laboratory and elsewhere have shown that the rare strain from the man whose case started the investigation is resistant to 19 of the 20 licensed anti-retroviral drugs. AIDS experts said that the strain may have led to the rapid onset of AIDS in the man or that his immune defenses may have been weakened by drug use or genetic factors

About 1 percent of all people infected are ''slow progressors,'' who take decades to get sick. The reasons are unknown, but some have genetic mutations that disable the receptors on the outside of the CD-4 immune system cells to which the virus attaches. The man in New York, who is clearly a fast progressor, has a ''dual-tropic'' strain of the virus, which means it can attach to two types of receptors, which are nicknamed the R5 and X4 receptors, on the outside of the CD-4 cell. In the vast majority of people who get infected, said Dr. Robert C. Gallo, a co-discoverer of the AIDS virus, the first infections are attached to the R5 receptors. Only after several years do the X4 receptors kick in, and then the patient's condition often worsens quickly

About 1 percent of all people infected are 'slow progressors,' who take decades to become sick. At the other end of the spectrum will be 1 percent to 2 percent who are 'fast progressors,' who go to full-blown AIDS -- meaning low numbers of CD-4 immune-system cells and opportunistic infections such as Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia - - in months. The average time between infection and AIDS is seven to 10 years. The New York man, who is clearly a fast-progressor, has a 'dual- tropic' strain of the virus, which means it can attach to two types of receptors, nicknamed the R5 and X4 receptors, on the outside of the CD-4 cell. In a vast majority of infected people, said Dr. Robert Gallo, a co-discoverer of the AIDS virus, the first infections are attached to the R5 receptors. Only after several years do the X4 receptors kick in, and then the patient often goes downhill quickly

On the day after the announcement a rare strain of the AIDS virus was found in a New York City man, scientists said much work needed to be done to assess just how dangerous the virus is. Anthony Fauci, a prominent AIDS researcher and head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said he had seen cases where two sexual partners had been infected by the same strain and 'one does reasonably well, and the other progresses fulminantly' - meaning the immune system of the second person collapses rapidly. At the other end of the spectrum will be one to two per cent who are 'fast progressors,' who go to full-blown AIDS - meaning very low numbers of CD-4 cells and opportunistic infections like pneumocystis carinii pneumonia - in months. The average time between infection and AIDS is seven to 10 years

The strain, A/California/7/2004 (H3N2), was first identified from a specimen taken from a patient who had influenza in September, said Dr. Carol Glaser, chief of the viral branch of the California Department of Health Services. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta identified the strain as a new one in January, Glaser said. On Thursday at the World Health Organization headquarters in Geneva, a panel of influenza experts recommended including the California strain in next season's vaccine. The panel meets twice a year to try to match the strains included in the vaccine recommended for each hemisphere with those expected to be circulating in those hemispheres during the next season. The vaccine is produced in sequential steps. The manufacturers start about January with the strain that they least expect to be changed, then move to the second strain. In a third step, they produce the newest strain, expected by the end of March. Then they produce the entire vaccine