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How Did The First Person Get Hiv

How Did Hiv Spread From Kinshasa

who was the first person to get hiv ?

The area around Kinshasa is full of transport links, such as roads, railways and rivers. The area also had a growing sex trade around the time that HIV began to spread. The high population of migrants and sex trade might explain how HIV spread along these infrastructure routes. By 1937, it had reached Brazzaville, about 120km west of Kinshasa.

The lack of transport routes into the North and East of the country accounts for the significantly fewer reports of infections there at the time.11

By 1980, half of all infections in DR Congo were in locations outside of the Kinshasa area, reflecting the growing epidemic.12

Origin And Epidemic Emergence

Several of the theories of HIV origin accept the established knowledge of the HIV/SIV phylogenetic relationships, and also accept that bushmeat practice was the most likely cause of the initial transfer to humans. All of them propose that the simultaneous epidemic emergences of four HIV groups in the late 19th-early 20th century, and the lack of previous known emergences, are explained by new factor that appeared in the relevant African regions in that timeframe. These new factor would have acted either to increase human exposures to SIV, to help it to adapt to the human organism by mutation , or to cause an initial burst of transmissions crossing an epidemiological threshold, and therefore increasing the probability of continued spread.

Genetic studies of the virus suggested in 2008 that the most recent common ancestor of the HIV-1 M group dates back to the Belgian Congo city of Léopoldville , circa 1910. Proponents of this dating link the HIV epidemic with the emergence of colonialism and growth of large colonial African cities, leading to social changes, including a higher degree of non-monogamous sexual activity, the spread of prostitution, and the concomitant high frequency of genital ulcer diseases in nascent colonial cities.

Social changes and urbanization

Colonialism in Africa

This theory was later dubbed “Heart of Darkness” by Jim Moore, alluding to the book of the same title written by Joseph Conrad, the main focus of which is colonial abuses in equatorial Africa.

A Timeline Of Hiv And Aids

The HIV.gov Timeline reflects the history of the domestic HIV/AIDS epidemic from the first reported cases in 1981 to the presentwhere advances in HIV prevention, care, and treatment offer hope for a long, healthy life to people who are living with, or at risk for, HIV and AIDS.

View a timeline of the current Ending the HIV Epidemic initiative. Please visit HIVHistory.org for a timeline of the global and domestic response to the HIV epidemic.

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How The First Person Got Aids

The identity of the first person to develop AIDS is still unknown, however, HIV-1 was first discovered from a preserved blood sample taken in 1959 from a Léopoldville man in the Belgian Congo. AIDS is also caused by HIV, which originates from non-human primates in Central and West Africa.

While 1959 was the time the disease was discovered, it didnt originate here. According to an article by Avert, scientists put together a family tree ancestry of HIV transmission, concluding that the virus originated in 1920 in Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of Congo . HIV was transmitted from SIV which attacks the immune systems of apes and monkeys.

As far as how the first person got HIV/AIDS, it is likely that it was passed through hunting and consumption of SIV-infected monkeys in Kinshasa. Theres also the possibility that the virus entered through cuts and wounds while hunting.

At first, the hunters body would fight off the disease, but over time, SIV had adapted itself within the human host and became HIV-1, the strain that caused the worldwide epidemic in the 80s.

Hiv And Aids: An Origin Story

How Did The First Person Get Aids On Earth

When HIV first began infecting humans in the 1970s, scientists were unaware of its existence. Now, more than 35 million people across the globe live with HIV/AIDS. The medical community, politicians and support organizations have made incredible progress in the fight against this formerly unknown and heavily stigmatized virus. Infection rates have fallen or stabilized in many countries across the world, but we have a long way to go.

Image via aids.gov. The WHO estimates that 97 percent of the world’s HIV positive population lives in low income nations where anti-viral treatments are scarce or unavailable.

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So Scientists Have Estimated When And Where The Most Deadly Type Of Hiv Started Infecting Humans

Most AIDS researchers believe that the “bushmeat trade” allowed the HIV-1 virus, and separately HIV-2, to enter the human bloodstream several times. Hunters who kill and butcher chimps and monkeys are regularly exposed to animal blood teeming with SIVs. If the hunters have cuts, bites, or scratches — and given the nature of their work they almost always do — they can catch the viruses from their prey. Hunters going after chimps in Cameroon could have caught the first strains of HIV-1. Sooty mangabeys, hunted and kept as pets in West Africa, could have transmitted HIV-2 to humans.

Africans have hunted chimps and monkeys and kept them as pets for centuries they’ve presumably been exposed to SIVs during most of that time. But the conditions needed for HIV to spread widely weren’t in place until after the continent was colonized and urbanized. The first victims would have found it easier to unwittingly spread the virus to sexual partners far and wide as roads and vehicles started connecting previously isolated villages and cities. Hospitals may have played a role, too. Strapped for cash, some of them probably re-used dirty needles, unknowingly infecting patients in the process.

How Did The First Person Get Aids

Jessica aidshivhow did the first person get aids

If you remember the AIDS epidemic from the 1980s, you may remember how big of a deal it was that a new disease was spreading throughout the world and affecting millions of people. While there are treatments for HIV, there is no cure once it turns into AIDS.

Heres how it all started.

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How Hiv Infects The Body

HIV infects the immune system, causing progressive damage and eventually making it unable to fight off infections.

The virus attaches itself to immune system cells called CD4 lymphocyte cells, which protect the body against various bacteria, viruses and other germs.

Once attached, it enters the CD4 cells and uses it to make thousands of copies of itself. These copies then leave the CD4 cells, killing them in the process.

This process continues until eventually the number of CD4 cells, also called your CD4 count, drops so low that your immune system stops working.

This process may take up to 10 years, during which time you’ll feel and appear well.

Page last reviewed: 22 April 2021 Next review due: 22 April 2024

When And Where Did Hiv Start In Humans

how did the first human get infected with hiv virus ?

Studies of some of the earliest known samples of HIV provide clues about when it first appeared in humans and how it evolved. The first verified case of HIV is from a blood sample taken in 1959 from a man living in what is now Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The sample was retrospectively analysed and HIV detected. There are numerous earlier cases where patterns of deaths from common opportunistic infections, now known to be AIDS-defining, suggest that HIV was the cause, but this is the earliest incident where a blood sample can verify infection.9

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The Link Between Hiv And Siv

HIV is a type of lentivirus, which means it attacks the immune system. In a similar way, the Simian Immunodeficiency Virus attacks the immune systems of monkeys and apes.1

Research found that HIV is related to SIV and there are many similarities between the two viruses. HIV-1 is closely related to a strain of SIV found in chimpanzees, and HIV-2 is closely related to a strain of SIV found in sooty mangabeys.2

Daniel G Garza 50 Laguna Beach Ca Hiv Patient Leader And Advocate:

The first time I ever felt truly represented in the HIV conversation it took a while. I think it was later on. I was diagnosed in September of 2000 in Houston. And even though I lived in the Valley, in the Valley of Texas, South Texas, and its the majorityits a little MexicoI didnt feel like really my voicenot that it wasnt represented, because there was a large group of Latinos. Its just, nobody was actually talking about it. It was the elephant in the room. And you kind of just skimmed around it.

And Ive said it for many years: The religious, the cultural, and the social of it all, of being Latino, stopped us from having a conversation. It wasnt until I moved to Houston and took an advocacy workshop, training, thatthis is going to sound very conceited, but thatI started putting my story out, and really started to talk about it, and saying, I am Latino. Im Catholic. I was born in Mexico, and talking about it, that other people started approaching me and saying, Oh, wow. Youre sharing my story.

So, it was through meI dont like the word braveI think out of necessity, I shared my story in hopes that fishing, that you would catch something. And eventually, people started coming out of the woodwork and saying, Wow. You are me. And thats when I started identifying with other people.

Charles Sanchez for TheBody

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How Hiv Spread To Haiti

Unfortunately, Haiti was hit hard by the B subtype of HIV-1, which is a subtype of strain M. This was because many of the professionals working in the colonial Democratic Republic of Congo were from Haiti and returned home in the 1960s. They were initially blamed for spreading the virus to the already-poor country, causing severe racism, stigma and discrimination.

Now, HIV-1 subtype M is the most common subtype of HIV, contributing to 75 million infections around the world.

Pathogenicity Of Siv In Non

But if AIDS is sexually transmitted how did the first ...

In most non-human primate species, natural SIV infection does not cause a fatal disease . Comparison of the gene sequence of SIV with HIV should, therefore, give us information about the factors necessary to cause disease in humans. The factors that determine the virulence of HIV as compared to most SIVs are only now being elucidated. Non-human SIVs contain a nef gene that down-regulates CD3, CD4, and MHC class I expression most non-human SIVs, therefore, do not induce immunodeficiency the HIV-1nef gene, however, has lost its ability to down-regulate CD3, which results in the immune activation and apoptosis that is characteristic of chronic HIV infection.

In addition, a long-term survey of chimpanzees naturally infected with SIVcpz in Gombe, Tanzania found that, contrary to the previous paradigm, chimpanzees with SIVcpz infection do experience an increased mortality, and also suffer from a Human AIDS-like illness. SIV pathogenicity in wild animals could exist in other chimpanzee subspecies and other primate species as well, and stay unrecognized by lack of relevant long term studies.

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Hiv/aids In The 1990s And 2000s

In 1991, the red ribbon became an international symbol of AIDS awareness.

In that year, basketball player Magic Johnson announced he had HIV, helping to further bring awareness to the issue and dispel the stereotype of it being a gay disease. Soon after, Freddie Mercurylead singer of the band Queenannounced he had AIDS and died a day later.

In 1994, the FDA approved the first oral HIV test. Two years later, it approved the first home testing kit and the first urine test.

AIDS-related deaths and hospitalizations in developed countries began to decline sharply in 1995 thanks to new medications and the introduction of HAART. Still, by 1999, AIDS was the fourth biggest cause of death in the world and the leading cause of death in Africa.

Who Was Ryan White

The Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program was named for a courageous young man named Ryan White who was diagnosed with AIDS following a blood transfusion in December 1984. Ryan White was diagnosed at age 13 while living in Kokomo, Indiana and was given six months to live. When Ryan White tried to return to school, he fought AIDS-related discrimination in his Indiana community. Along with his mother Jeanne White Ginder, Ryan White rallied for his right to attend school – gaining national attention – and became the face of public education about his disease. Surprising his doctors, Ryan White lived five years longer than predicted. He died in April 1990, one month before his high school graduation and only months before Congress passed the legislation bearing his name in August 1990 – the Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency Act.

Listen to Jeanne White Ginder recount those early years of struggle, pain, and triumph. Scroll down to listen to all five dialogs:

It was really bad. People were really cruel, people said that he had to be gay, that he had to have done something bad or wrong, or he wouldn’t have had it. It was God’s punishment, we heard the God’s punishment a lot. That somehow, some way he had done something he shouldn’t have done or he wouldn’t have gotten AIDS.

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Individual Symptoms Of Hiv Vary From One Person To Another If You Have An Active Sex Life Or Think You May Have Been Exposed To Hiv It Is Important To Get Tested Here Are Some Common Symptoms Of Hiv Many People Experience Severe Flu

This article is also available in Simplified Chinese and Thai.

Symptoms of HIV can vary between individuals however the first signs of infection generally appear within the first 1-2 months. Many, but not all, people will experience severe flu-like symptoms which is your bodys natural response to the virus. This is called the seroconversion period.

Its during this time that its crucial to identify if HIV is the cause, as your viral load is very high which greatly increases the risk of passing it on. And the only way to know for sure is by getting tested.

How Is Hiv Spread From Person To Person

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HIV can only be spread through specific activities. In the United States, the most common ways are:

  • Having vaginal or anal sex with someone who has HIV without using a condom or taking medicines to prevent or treat HIV. Anal sex is riskier than vaginal sex.
  • Sharing injection drug equipment , such as needles, with someone who has HIV.

Less common ways are:

  • From mother to child during pregnancy, birth, or breastfeeding. However, the use of HIV medicines and other strategies have helped lower the risk of mother-to-child transmission of HIV to 1% or less in the United States.
  • Getting stuck with an HIV-contaminated needle or other sharp object. This is a risk mainly for health care workers. The risk is very low.

HIV is spread only in extremely rare cases by:

  • Having oral sex. But in general, the chance that an HIV-negative person will get HIV from oral sex with an HIV-positive partner is extremely low.

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Where Did Hiv Come From A Look At The Origins Of The Pandemic Of Our Time

A chimpanzees virus has killed 35 million humans.

That virus, commonly known as HIV, is the defining pandemic of our time. More than 35 million people have been killed by the virus to date. But the virus itself didnt get its start in humans.

HIV/AIDS is, like the vast majority of emerging viruses infecting people, zoonotic in nature. The AIDS crisis, as we generally think of it, began in the 1980s. First as a mysterious illness primarily infecting gay men in urban areas in the United States. But thats not really the beginning. Before the diseases first mention in 1982 in the New York Times, people had been dying of AIDS for at least a decade, though probably not much longer. In Africa, HIVthe virus that causes AIDShad jumped from chimpanzees to humans sometime early in the 20th century.

To date, the earliest known case of HIV-1 infection in human blood is from a sample taken in 1959 from a man whod died in Kinshasa in what was then the Belgian Congo.

Its this fact which keeps me awake at night. Imagine, for a moment, that the HIV virus in that 1959 sample had been studied and identified. If, in the 1950s, the scientific community realized the potential harm this new virus could unleash. What could we have done? What therapies could we have developed before it became one of the deadliest pandemics in human history? Would we have a cure by now?

That work takes several forms, including:

Canadian Flight Attendant Theory

A Canadian airline steward named Gaëtan Dugas was referred to as “Case 057” and later “Patient O” with the alphabet letter “O” standing for “outside Southern California”, in an early AIDS study by Dr. William Darrow of the Centers for Disease Control. Because of this, many people had considered Dugas to be responsible for taking HIV to North America. However, HIV reached New York City around 1971 while Dugas did not start work at Air Canada until 1974. In Randy Shilts‘ 1987 book And the Band Played On , Dugas is referred to as AIDS’s Patient Zero instead of “Patient O”, but neither the book nor the movie states that he had been the first to bring the virus to North America. He was incorrectly called “Patient Zero” because at least 40 of the 248 people known to be infected by HIV in 1983 had had sex with him, or with a person who had sexual intercourse with Dugas.

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