Notes On The Aids Epidemic - 1955 Words

Rosy Acosta Mr. Gehring 2nd Period AM History II Honors Unlocking Indiscreet Darkness: The AIDS Epidemic in the U.S HIV originated in Kinshasa, in the Democratic Republic of Congo around 1920, when HIV crossed species from chimpanzees to humans. HIV stands for the Human Immunodeficiency Virus, if you are infected with HIV, your body will try to fight the infection with special molecules called â€Å"antibodies.† Being HIV-positive is not the same as having AIDS, stands for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome: Acquired means you can get infected with it; Immune Deficiency means a weakness in the body’s system that fights diseases; Syndrome means a group of health problems that make up a disease. You don’t just â€Å"get† AIDS, you may be infected†¦show more content†¦This marked the first official reporting of what came to be known as the AIDS epidemic. On the following day, June 6th, 1981, the Associated Press and the Los Angeles Times reported on the MMWR. The San Francisco Chronicle covered the story, and within days doctors from all across the US flooded CD C with reports of similar cases. In addition, CDC also received reports of a rare and weirdly aggressive cancer called Kaposi’s Sarcoma, in a group of gay men in New York and California. On June 8th, CDC developed a Task Force on Kaposi’s Sarcoma and Opportunistic Infections (KSOI) to identify risk factors and establish a case definition for national surveillance. On July 3rd, there were about 41 cases of Kaposi’s Sarcoma allegedly affecting gay men in New York and California, by the end of the year there was a total of 270 reported cases of severe immune deficiency in gay men, and about 121 of those men died. http://www.webmd.com/hiv-aids/ss/slideshow-aids-retrospective AIDS first started affecting relatively healthy young gay men in the U.S in 1981. 1982, San Francisco, working closely with the Shanti Project and the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, established the â€Å"San Francisco Model of Care† which emphasizes home and community based services. In January, the first American AIDS clinic was developed in San Francisco. That same month, the Gay Men’s Health Crisis, the