Anton Pozniak
British Journal of Hospital Medicine 69(3): 126
(Mar 2008)
In June 1981 the US Center for Disease Control reported the occurrence, without identifiable cause, of an unusual pneumonia caused by Pneumocystis carinii (now jirovecii) in five apparently healthy men in Los Angeles. In that first year over 1600 cases of this new form of severe immunodeficiency were diagnosed with close to 700 deaths. Two years later, after much speculation, the human retrovirus HIV-1 was isolated and found to be the cause of this severe immune deficiency syndrome. Over a decade later effective treatment was discovered, so-called highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART), consisting of usually three antiviral compounds. Ten years after the widespread introduction of HAART there are still 33.2 million people living with HIV globally and most have no access to antiviral treatment.
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