I have a question that doesn't necessarily belongs to this forum (about AIDS)

but I want to ask it anyway. I remember reading an interview in a Puerto Rican newspaper of one of the most important gay activists in the island, who claims that he should have been infected by the virus before 1981, and he mentioned 1979. He was a flight attendant then and he lived in NYC, and I remember him saying that already in the gay community in NY by late 1978 and early 1979 there was talk about people dying because of a rare disease.

For those of you that were around then, could that be true? Is 1981 just the "accepted" date and not the actual date in which AIDS started spreading across the USA? Was there talk about something going on before then?

It's something that has puzzled me for some time.

...was probably in 1969 or during the early 1970s:



Is this what you were asking?

was there a certain knowledge in some circles, like the gay community in NY (as the Puerto Rican activist says), that something strange was happening before it became known nationally?

Can't help with that one.

but if I remember correctly, it had not clustered, the data was pretty sporadic and nobody had been able to put the data together until the early 80's.
AIDS was actually a mutation of an existing virus. That is one reason why it was hard to isolate.

http://www.cnn.com/HEALTH/9802/03/earliest.aids/

CHICAGO (CNN) -- HIV probably originated in the late 1940s or early 1950s, and showed up in people 10 to 20 years earlier than has previously been estimated, researchers said Tuesday.

Dr. David Ho and colleagues from the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center in New York told a conference they traced the very first case of HIV infection to a man living in what was then the Belgian Congo in 1959.

The scientists found HIV in a blood sample taken from the man, who was a member of the Bantu tribe. The HIV in the sample looks like an ancestor of several subtypes of HIV now found around the world, suggesting that HIV "evolved from a single introduction into the African population in a time frame not long before 1959," the researchers said.

Leading AIDS researchers said Ho's new study, which is detailed in the latest edition of the journal "Nature," is a significant advance in the understanding of the disease and could prove important in developing an AIDS vaccine.

I appreciate it.

I lived in California at the time and there were a lot of diseases going around, a lot. I met my current husband in Sept 1980 and left the state, that's why that's kind of a marker in time for me. I can't swear to it, it's just what I vaguely remember.

the aids question.
October 15, 1982

The Briefing Room

12:45pm EDT

Q: Larry, does the President have any reaction to the announcement ­ the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, that AIDS is now an epidemic and have over 600 cases?

MR. SPEAKES: What's AIDS?

Q: Over a third of them have died. It's known as "gay plague." (Laughter.) No, it is. I mean it's a pretty serious thing that one in every three people that get this have died. And I wondered if the President is aware of it?

MR. SPEAKES: I don't have it. Do you? (Laughter.)

Q: No, I don't.

MR. SPEAKES: You didn't answer my question.

Q: Well, I just wondered, does the President ­

MR. SPEAKES: How do you know? (Laughter.)

Q: In other words, the White House looks on this as a great joke?

MR. SPEAKES: No, I don't know anything about it, Lester.

Q: Does the President, does anyone in the White House know about this epidemic, Larry?

MR. SPEAKES: I don't think so. I don't think there's been any ­

Q: Nobody knows?

MR. SPEAKES: There has been no personal experience here, Lester.

Q: No, I mean, I thought you were keeping ­

MR. SPEAKES: I checked thoroughly with Dr. Ruge this morning and he's had no ­ (laughter) ­ no patients suffering from AIDS or whatever it is.

Q: The President doesn't have gay plague, is that what you're saying or what?

MR. SPEAKES: No, I didn't say that.

Q: Didn't say that?

MR. SPEAKES: I thought I heard you on the State Department over there. Why didn't you stay there? (Laughter.)

Q: Because I love you Larry, that's why (Laughter.)

MR. SPEAKES: Oh I see. Just don't put it in those terms, Lester. (Laughter.)

Q: Oh, I retract that.

MR. SPEAKES: I hope so.

Q: It's too late.

To answer your question there were several Gay men in the US and Sweden -- and heterosexuals in Tanzania and Haiti -- begin showing signs of what will later be called AIDS.This was 1978

1980 Deaths in US -- 31 (includes all known cases 1981 and before)

1981 On June 5th, the CDC reports that in the period October 1980-May 1981, 5 young men, all active homosexuals, were treated for biopsy-confirmed Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia at 3 different hospitals in Los Angeles, California. Two of the patients died.

for those who want to see how the Reagan administration "handled it"

I can't compare with the information from the press conference posted above, but this is how I remember that era.


I was born in '63, When I was 19 I moved to a ski resort in Colorado. The first winter that I was there (82-83) I worked at a restaurant where a waiter had recently died. The restaurant closed for a night to hold a benefit for the former employee. (to help with medical bills and burial costs if I remember correctly) I donated my time working that benefit as did everyone else who worked there, even though many of us had never met him.


Anyways.... It turned out that that waiter had died of AIDS (again this would have been in 1982). I was 19 years old and had no idea at all what the hell AIDS was or that it even existed. I had to have people I was working with explain it to me. I could try to describe my shock (as well as my fear) that an incurable STD that I had never heard of killed someone in the community, but I don't have the words. The whole "Gay Thing" never came into play for this discussion (other than the fact that he was gay and would have caught it that way), remember it was the poor guys friends and coworkers that were explaining it to me.

My point is that I don't think many people knew about AIDS in the early to mid 80s. I don't even remember calling it AIDS, back then AIDS was a diet pill.

That does not mean that The President shouldn't have made a point to know about it or at least delegated someone to deal with the threat or to educate the public about it. I suppose 600 cases could be considered a large number, but in New York 600 cases may have seemed like a small number. I don't really know. I can't pass judgment on Reagan's actions, or failure to act, I was only 19 and clearly ignorant on the subject.

I must also admit that I have never lost anyone I truly cared about to this disease, a close friend's cousin who I had a casual friendship with is the greatest loss it has caused me. I therefore do not have the strong feelings that others who have posted here clearly do have.

I can say that I am very sorry for your loss.


Well, that's my two cents worth. I hope it helps.

Me and my partner rented a home with eight other gay couples - all males. The couples were from L.A., San Francisco, Buffalo NY, Chicago, Philadelphia, New York, Houston and Dallas. The men from California already had several friends that had died from "gay pneumonia". The couple from New York also had several friends that were sick. Everyone knew that something was going on in the gay male community before they arrived that summer and the speculation as to cause was wild, fearful and never ending.

Sadly, one of the men from New York died within a year. Two of the men from California died with three years. None of the sixteen men we played with that summer are still alive.

It's so terrible. It's terrible... I feel anger when I read your post... why so many lives lost? Why was this neglected for so long if it was around already?

It was just queers - who cares if they all die?

I know that sounds too simple but it is just that simple.

You can imagine that I too hate Reagan. I don't really want to comment on him however - he doesn't deserve a moment of my time.

On edit for a further comment. It would be several more years before the conclusion was reached that it was a sexually transmitted disease. During the early years speculation about cause ranged from use/abuse of poppers to fruit fly feces. Because it was not known to be sexually transmitted the men did not begin to use condoms for several more years. In other words, all of my friends that would now range in age from 50 to 65 had the virus before they knew to use condoms. I have one friend remaining who is over 60. The reason he is alive today is because he did not catch - he just pitched and in addition he was just damn lucky.

I've known far too many who are also dead. Many of us just survived because we got lucky.

It is so sad to hear these stories ... I wonder how many lives could have been saved if the government had done more to urgently launch a non-judgmental education program about it, and if more funding had been available. Just really really sad.

http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_2830.shtml

Have you asked the CIA? Would they tell you anyway?
Or have they been promiscuous? Have they been promiscuous?

and needed several blood transfusions. There wasn't a lot of information about it or the safety of the blood banks. Most people were led to believe that only homosexuals could contract it. Later on we learned that was not true and it had already spread through the blood banks. At first, my parents were advised to have my brother tested frequently, then told that they shouldn't, because of the "stigma" ,it would go on his record, and people were so frightened of it, it wouldn't be in his best interests. Besides my parents were told, if he did contract it, nothing could be done for him anyway. Real Nice. Just one of the reasons, among many, that I detest Reagan. It was "okay" if it just efffected the gay community, Reagan was fine with that.

I wish I could say the same for one of my best friends. Served as best man at my wedding before telling us of his diagnosis and dying 7 months later. The history of our government's biological research is reason enough not to believe a word they or their spokesmen say.