AIDS

Essay by PaperNerd ContributorCollege, Undergraduate August 2001

download word file, 3 pages 0.0

AIDS Have you ever had a friend, relative or anyone else you know die from AIDS? I did. My Uncle died of AIDS on November 28 1995. I learned a lot about the disease during the time period that my uncle was still alive. Still ever since then I have been very interested in learning as much as I can about the disease. This Essay will talk about the history, current status of the disease, and what the future might hold for the disease.

I am going to start off talking about what the disease does, how it does it, and some of the other basic information about the disease. HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) is the virus that causes AIDS (Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome). HIV damages the immune system, the part of the body that fights infection. The immune system becomes weak and infections begin to attack the body.

As these conditions get worse, a person is diagnosed with AIDS. Some scientists believe HIV spread from monkeys to humans between 1926 and 1946. Recent research indicates HIV most probably first jumped from chimpanzees to humans as early as 1675 and didn't establish itself as an epidemic strain in Africa until 1930. In 1959 a man died in the Congo in what researchers now say was the first proven AIDS death. By 1980 there had been 31 deaths in the U.S. In 1981 an alarming rate of a rare cancer was begin to appear in gay men. They called the disease GRID (gay-related immune deficiency). By the end of 1981 422 people had been diagnosed and 159 have already died from the disease. This is the first year that the disease is called AIDS. The causes of the immune deficiencies seen in the disease are still unknown. In 1983 The...