Fascinating.
So if everyone in the world was infected, the world population would shrink 300 folds with those surviving remaining healthy.
Anyone feel like gambling?
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THE AIDS/HIV Thread (merged)
Re: AIDS patients who stay healthy
by napoleon » Fri 18 Aug 2006, 12:01:25
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Re: AIDS patients who stay healthy
by Miki » Fri 18 Aug 2006, 16:35:23
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PrairieMule', 'T')his is not exactly oil related but I was facinated when stumbled across this article today. Apperently 1 in 300 HIV infected never degrade in health +10 years after infection. I guess that includes Magic Johnson. link Paging Dr.SPG! What's your take on this?
Fascinating indeed. I'm really curious to know what makes it different for these "elite" patients. I hope future research on this will help us provide a better qualty of life for HIV patients. The progress of the research on HIV has been slow but steady. Let's hope for the best.
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Re: AIDS patients who stay healthy
by mmasters » Fri 18 Aug 2006, 17:01:18
I know of a friend of a friend who was one of the first 5 people diagnosed. He's still alive and well. He has had HIV for about 30 years. The key is he has very healthy habits, eats well, does not do drugs, drink or smoke.
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Re: AIDS patients who stay healthy
by PrairieMule » Fri 18 Aug 2006, 17:07:47
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mmasters', 'I') know of a friend of a friend who was one of the first 5 people diagnosed. He's still alive and well. He has had HIV for about 30 years. The key is he has very healthy habits, eats well, does not do drugs, drink or smoke.
Good advise for the non infected as well. Seriously- more power to your friend MM.
I don't think AIDS is as much in the forefront of American Concousness as it was 20 years ago.
Not sure if this study will lead anywhere. The world could use some good news for a change.
If you give a man a fish you will have kept him from hunger for a day. If you teach a man to fish he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day.
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Re: AIDS patients who stay healthy
by Ayame » Fri 18 Aug 2006, 18:01:27
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mmasters', ' ')The key is he has very healthy habits, eats well, does not do drugs, drink or smoke.
That's rubbish. As with most virus epidemics there is an 'elite' (if you must call them that although lucky would be a more appropriate term) group of individuals that have a genome that endows them with the ability to survive the virus in question. Take myxomatosis in rabbits for example, after it was introducted 97% of rabbits died off but there were survivers and they passed their DNA immunity on to most of their progeny who thrive today. And take my word for it, these 'elite' rabbits weren't eating a better healty type of grass etc. It was nothing special they did, its was just by pure random chance that they had the right DNA to survive the myxomatosis virus.
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Re: AIDS patients who stay healthy
by lotrfan55345 » Sun 20 Aug 2006, 02:43:05
Hmm... I thought most people who got HIV never got symptoms, just like Herpes.
Then they wouldn't know they had HIV because they don't have the syptoms to get tested and never progress to getting AIDS.
Then they wouldn't know they had HIV because they don't have the syptoms to get tested and never progress to getting AIDS.
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Re: AIDS patients who stay healthy
by azreal60 » Sun 20 Aug 2006, 09:12:25
All you need to make that statement correct is most people don't get symptoms right away. The problem is except for those deep end of the gene pool people described in the article, everyone else eventually get's symptoms. It just takes years. Long latency time.
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Re: AIDS patients who stay healthy
by ChumpusRex2 » Sun 20 Aug 2006, 12:48:22
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('lotrfan55345', 'H')mm... I thought most people who got HIV never got symptoms, just like Herpes.
Then they wouldn't know they had HIV because they don't have the syptoms to get tested and never progress to getting AIDS.
Then they wouldn't know they had HIV because they don't have the syptoms to get tested and never progress to getting AIDS.
HIV infection has relatively few symptoms.
There is an initial illness which is rather like glandular fever (infection mononucleosis) - fever, vague pains, tiredness, swollen glands, etc. which lasts for a few weeks-months.
From then there is a period of very few, or no, symptoms. Then gradually the virus begins to diminish the immune system, eventually leading to AIDS. The symptom free period can be long (up to 20 years), but essentially everybody infected with HIV will progress to AIDS in time. One of the aims of anti-viral treatment is to prolong this period, and with the latest cocktails the virus can be so effectively stopped that there may be no progression while taking the drugs.
How long that time is depends on a number of things, but the strain of the virus they were infected with appears important (e.g. strains from inner-city drug users or prostitutes tend to progress to AIDS much quicker than strains from poor communities in Africa - presumably this is an evolutionary response to rate of transmission - if the main mode of transmission is sexual in a near monogamous community, then the virus shouldn't kill the host too quickly, but if one person can infect 20 a month, then delaying tactics aren't necessary or desirable).
What this article is describing is a very few people who seem simply to fight the virus off during the initial illness phase. It never manages to get a grip and embed itself deep within immune system cells.
This seems to be due to the natural genetic variability between people, particularly in the genes that build the immune system and control how it detects viruses. This is a very important from a population perspective - because it means that if a virus does manage to find a way past the immune system, it won't necessarily affect every single person.
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