Human Immunodeficiency Virus ( Hiv )

It is believed that the first case of HIV/AIDs was first recorded somewhere in West Africa somewhere in the beginning of the twentieth century. Since then, it has spread across central Africa, undetected for a long time. But the question that has bewildered many, is how HIV spread in the first place. According to “Natural Transfer Theory”, HIV was spread to humans through chimpanzees. “Africans have been killing and eating monkey for at least fifty thousand years” (43). It was common for small African communities to hunt and eat chimpanzees. Chimpanzees were said to have “SIVs, simian immunodeficiency viruses that closely resembles HIV” (41). The virus is said to have spread to humans through these infected chimpanzees. The blood of these chimpanzees could have

In the 1980s, a mysterious disease began to take the lives of Americans. With the cause unknown, a fear grew among Americans. An unusually high rate of people was becoming sick with strange and rare diseases. When experimental treatments failed to work, people died. This mysterious disease is what we now know as HIV–Human Immunodeficiency Virus. In the past thirty-five years, the HIV has taken many turns in history. Although we do not hear about HIV and AIDS now, it is still a prevalent issue in the United States and in the world.

In 1920 a disease would enter the world in change lives of many people around the world. The most powerful scientists and researchers tired to find answers regarding the strange disease but unfortunately they will spend years with unanswered questions. In this research paper, I decided to look back and discuss evidence about the origin of HIV, and find out where, how, and when the disease first began to cause illness in humans. However, this paper will mainly focus on how HIV impacts the community worldwide.

In the 1920's, HIV crossed from chimps to humans. There is evidence on how, when and where HIV first began to cause illness in humans. HIV is a type of lentivirus, which means it attacks the immune system. In a similar way, the Simian Immunodeficiency Virus (SIV) attacks the immune systems of monkeys and apes. There is even a theory on hunters, in the Democratic Republic of Congo eating monkey and transfer the virus. These well-known diseases, travel from Africa, Kinshasa to the United States. Started off being called GRID also known as gay-related immune deficiency introduced to united state in 1981. This disease has taken 121 healthy gay man lives in the U.S. since the mid-1970s. Scientists began to notice clusters of Kaposi's sarcoma and

It is proven that the source of the HIV virus was from a type of chimpanzees located in West Africa ("Where Did HIV Come From?"). The chimpanzees carried a virus called simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV) which is similar to HIV ("Where Did HIV Come From?"). It is thought that when it was transferred the humans it mutated into HIV ("Where Did HIV Come From?"). The disease was transferred to humans by hunting the chimpanzees and eating the meat off of them ("Where Did HIV Come

This book talks about how recent genetic evidence form new discoveries have traced the birth of AIDS to being rooted in the southeastern forests of Cameroon in Africa, where chimpanzees had a very similar strain of Human Immunodeficiency Virus in their blood. They carried this simian immunodeficiency virus for hundreds of years without creating any major, large-scale outbreak in humans. The birth origin story of HIV may have been happened sometime around 1880 to 1920. TImberg and Halperin discuss that the birth of HIV most likely occurred when a European hunter traveling in

As early as 1930, a cross-spices viral transmission of simian immunodeficiency viruses took hold between African primates and the native people. Subsequently, this crossover underwent mutations and adapted to the human host, resulting in an undetected, yet devastating retrovirus that slowly spread among the African people (Sharp & Hahn, 2011). By 1960, and still undetected the virus escaped Africa’s borders and made entry to other parts of the world, first Hatti followed by the United States (Hildreth & Alcendor, 2009). Consequently, by 1980 this undetected virus reared its ugly head while leaving a global path of destruction by infecting “between 100,000 and 300,000 people” (AVERT, 2016, para. 2) while claiming the lives of countless others. The first signs of trouble surfaced when in 1981, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) on five cases of Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia (PCP) among five otherwise healthy gay men in Los Angeles (CDC, 2001). Subsequently, this report gained the attention of the medical field and in response, they began the arduous task of connecting the dots.

Molecular epidemiologic data suggest that HIV type 1 (HIV-1), the most common subtype of HIV that infects humans, has been derived from the simian immunodeficiency virus, called SIVcpz, of the Pan troglodytes troglodytes subspecies of chimpanzee. The lentivirus strain SIVcpz is highly homologous with HIV-1, and another form of simian immunodeficiency virus found in sooty mangabeys (SIVsm) has similarities as

History: HIV was believed to have originated in the Congo, where it was transmitted when a human came in contact with a species of chimpanzee that had acquired the virus. From then on, the virus only continued to spread, where it could have been believed to infect anywhere from 100,000 to 300,000 people (“History of HIV and AIDS Overview”). The first forms of confirmed HIV discovered in the world took forms in two highly dangerous illnesses, Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia (PCP) and Kaposi’s Sarcoma. These rare diseases were first discovered and researched, although they didn’t know they were directly linked

Unlike the plague, the Human Immunodeficiency Virus is species specific and has puzzled many scientist about the possibility of overcoming its harsh implications. This mean that HIV can be found only within a particular species and, in this case, this virus tends to attack the human race. Many blame that the very existence of AIDS emerged from gay people or relations with animals, but it’s believed that transmission of this virus originated from a close derivative of HIV, SIV. SIV in known as Simian Immunodeficiency Virus which the Monkey virus that is equivalent to HIV. It has been known that the development of AIDS started with the transmission of SIV to humans via being bitten by a primates or the consumption of a primate who is infected

HIV and AIDS have affected millions of people throughout the world. Since 1981, there have been 25 million deaths due to AIDS involving men, women, and children. Presently there are 40 million people living with HIV and AIDS around the world and two million die each year from AIDS related illnesses. The Center for Disease Control estimates that one-third of the one million Americans living with HIV are not aware that they have it. The earliest known case of HIV was in 1959. It was discovered in a blood sample from a man in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo. Looking further into the genetics of this blood sample researchers suggested that it had originated from a virus going back to the late 1940’s or early 1950’s. In 1999,

In the past four decades, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) has been discovered, developed into an international epidemic, and

HIV-1, responsible for most of the disease today, was first discovered to have originated from Chimpanzees in 1999. HIV-2, the second type of the virus, was discovered to be transmitted through monkeys most likely through the consumption of their meat. There are two different types of the illness: HIV-1 and HIV-2. HIV, Human Immunodeficiency Virus, essentially breaks down the body’s CD4 cells which help to assist fighting off infections in your body. Overtime, this will hindrance your body’s ability to fight off diseases which can be potentially life threatening. The last stage of HIV is linked to AIDS, Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome. AIDS is a specific group of diseases/conditions that are indicative of severe immunosuppression related to infection with HIV. This makes people infected with the disease more vulnerable to opportunistic infections which their body will be unable to fight off towards the later stages of the disease. Most people diagnosed with AIDS have an estimated three years to live, but people that do not get diagnosed have an estimated one year to survive.

After further research, they found that the chimps ate two smaller species of monkeys that had two different strains of SIV, allowing the virus to transmit into the chimps. Because the smaller monkeys were infected with two different strains of SIV, it was inevitable that the chimps would be infected with both kinds, and in some cases even developed mutated versions of the two combined. When these strains mutated, they became capable to infect humans, and this mutation became known as HIV. Humans in the area that the infected chimps lived in hunted the chimps for food, and so HIV was brought into the human population. In most cases, the infected human’s immune system fought off HIV, but sometimes it stayed and became a parasite in the new host, making this host HIV-1. More than one HIV-1 people exist because more than one person contracted it from the monkeys, and so the strain in each HIV-1 was different. HIV is classified into four substrains; M, N, O, and P. Strain M is the responsible for most AIDS deaths. (Origin story from www.avert.org) Right now, 36.7 million people globally are living with HIV, (www.aids.gov) and 2.1 in 100,000 people will die from AIDS. (www.cdc.gov) In The Hot Zone, the Ebola origins are said to be in either fruit bats or primates at a cave in Africa known as Kitum Cave. In 1976, the poor man, Monet, went into that cave and inevitably contracted it, starting an outbreak to be followed by countless more. However, though it would be easier to just assume that we could follow the trail of that outbreak, that is not the case. That was just the outbreak of one out of 5 Ebola strains known as Ebola Zaire, the most deadly out of the filovirus strains with a 90% fatality rate. (www.who.int) A completely different outbreak began also in 1976 in Sudan when a hospital transmitted the disease from one infected patient to many

During the timeline of aids, studies show that the virus probably transferred to humans in Africa between 1884 and 1924 (Anabel Kanabus, 2009). There were signs of it spreading through Haiti in 1966; estimations of this virus entering the United States are in the 1970. African doctors see a rise in opportunistic infections; this means that it takes advantage of the opportunity offered by a weakened immune system. Western scientists and doctors remain ignorant of the growing epidemic; this is what caused HIV to spread and kill innocent lives. The first case of aids found was through gay men, following by drug users injecting themselves not using a clean sterilized needle. In 1982, aids were reported in several European countries, the name “AIDS” (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome), is created. In 1983, AIDS is reported among non-drug using women and children, Experts become more confident that the cause of AIDS is infectious.