The History of Developing Effective Treatments for HIV

[DaveO]

16 hours ago, DonRocks said:

Nastase is the earliest #1 in the photo; Laver is the first #1 in the Open Era (1968 and after) - I think the only one on this list no longer alive is Ashe, and that was just due to terrible luck - note that the list is for year-end #1s only; people like Rios, Safin, etc. were #1 mid-year, as the rankings were updated on a rolling basis.

It turns out others who were ranked #1 at year end are not in this photo:  Pete Sampras is probably the one with the longest period of year end #1 ranking who was not at that photo shoot.  Regardless, its a neat picture and between Nastase and recent and current #1's it covers a lot of decades, not just years.  That is a lot of tennis history.

Boy I disagree on the "luck" description concerning Arthur Ashe.  He reportedly contracted HIV from a blood transfusion in the 1980's due to a heart attack.   I knew someone over a long period, who died from Aids around the same time period as Ashe.  During his last year of life, while with AIDS, I watched him whither away at my best friends home (his brother).  It was devastating. 

During the 1980's another very close friend was a very active AIDS scientist working at some companies that were trying to find a cure for AIDS.  I knew his colleagues and the President of that firm (whose sister I dated for a bit).  I learned a fair amount about the entire scientific process wherein researchers around the globe were trying to find a cure for AIDS or a medicine(s) that would prevent HIV from turning into AIDS. 

One horrible accounting for the time it took to come up with a medicine that could prevent HIV from turning into AIDS was the political environment that severely limited total dollars and research to come up with an antidote.  It was overwhelmingly political in the US.  Funds were limited.  It was completely political.

There was no guarantee that more money, more research, more testing, more effort could have arrived at a cure more quickly.  But it might have.  The scientists were well connected in terms of sharing results and branching off into newer possible solutions.   It is possible that the "cocktail combination" of drugs that prevented HIV from turning into AIDS could have been discovered earlier with more money and more effort.

To me it was one of the ugly episodes of predjudiced politics that possibly resulted in many more deaths than needed to occur.   I can't accept the description of terrible luck. 

[DonRocks]

3 hours ago, DaveO said:

I can't accept the description of terrible luck. 

An unrelated surgery in 1988 necessitates a transfusion, and the blood in that transfusion is tainted with HIV because blood supplies weren't yet screened - if that isn't bad luck, I'm not sure what else to call it.

[DaveO]

11 hours ago, DonRocks said:

An unrelated surgery in 1988 necessitates a transfusion, and the blood in that transfusion is tainted with HIV because blood supplies weren't yet screened - if that isn't bad luck, I'm not sure what else to call it.

That is one perspective.  Not mine.

[DonRocks]

1 hour ago, DaveO said:

That is one perspective.  Not mine.

Okay, the floor is all yours: How was Arthur Ashe not unlucky?

[NolaCaine]

I had a blood transfusion (8 units, meaning 8 random people from New Orleans) when I was very young and before supplies were tested. When tested, I learned I was negative. 

I feel very, very lucky and did at the time too. Even getting tested at the time was...stigmatized and I was a child. 

[DaveO]

I have a long response.

Around 1992-1993 I watched as someone I had known for about 2+ decades died of AIDS.   Most of that last year he lived at his brothers home, his brother being my closest friend and lived in this area.  I watched as this extremely nice person withered away.  His body shrunk his skin turned sallow.  He grew weaker and weaker.  Immune deficiency.  His body could not fight off the bugs and illnesses that would kill all of us without that built in protection.  It took somewhat over a year from the time he learned that what had been HIV turned into AIDS.   In '92 earlier '93 there was no way to fight AIDS.  There was not a cure or a medicine.

AIDS hit the American consciousness in the very early 1980's.  It was known as a Gay Disease.  It was a complete mystery to science.  In its earliest days there was immense fear about it.  People including medical personnel were afraid to touch people with HIV or AIDS.   That fear lasted for a long time.  It was widespread.  In March of 1989 one of the more caring loving events with regard to the treatment and interactions of people with AIDS occurred--Barbara Bush, then first lady publicly hugged a baby and then an adult with AIDS.    That was 1989.  Years had passed.  The public still had an overwhelming fear connected to this disease.

In the earlier 1980's another of my closest friends bagged his MD and became a medical researcher.  As an intern or in his residency he had been treating patients with AIDS.  He joined a firm that was attacking the AIDS virus and ways to treat it via  a method that had fairly recently been developed and perfected.   The company was led by the PHD who had perfected this method and was funded by Venture Capitalists which also included corporate monies from various Pharmaceutical and other med oriented businesses.  My friend was close with the president and his wife and I dated the founder/Presidents sister. 

During that period I learned a lot about the scientific community, its efforts to spread information and knowledge and the funding of research.   Overwhelmingly the bulk of the money HAD to come from the Feds.  The Private world neither had the money to fully fund the science and the effort was very risky.   Over modern American history the Feds have funded many projects that ultimately proved valuable, ie Airplanes, Jets, large scale computers,  the internet, etc etc etc. 

The politics of the "80's severely limited the money and hence the research into addressing and searching for cures, medicines and antidotes for AIDS/HIV.   There were endless roads to go down.  There were researchers available.  There wasn't enough funding. 

Had more money gone into this research earlier, more avenues would have been tested and explored.   The likelihood was that the medicines that resulted in "cocktail drugs" that kept HIV from progressing to AIDS MIGHT have been discovered earlier.  Possibly a couple of years earlier.

A lot of people might have died because of those political considerations.  I can never describe the circumstances as connected to luck.  Crappy heartless politics contributed to many deaths. 

Come to think of it this administration hates science.  Funding is dropping in a wide variety of areas.   Many will die. 

[dcs]

1 hour ago, DaveO said:

I have a long response.

Around 1992-1993 I watched as someone I had known for about 2+ decades died of AIDS.   Most of that last year he lived at his brothers home, his brother being my closest friend and lived in this area.  I watched as this extremely nice person withered away.  His body shrunk his skin turned sallow.  He grew weaker and weaker.  Immune deficiency.  His body could not fight off the bugs and illnesses that would kill all of us without that built in protection.  It took somewhat over a year from the time he learned that what had been HIV turned into AIDS.   In '92 earlier '93 there was no way to fight AIDS.  There was not a cure or a medicine.

AIDS hit the American consciousness in the very early 1980's.  It was known as a Gay Disease.  It was a complete mystery to science.  In its earliest days there was immense fear about it.  People including medical personnel were afraid to touch people with HIV or AIDS.   That fear lasted for a long time.  It was widespread.  In March of 1989 one of the more caring loving events with regard to the treatment and interactions of people with AIDS occurred--Barbara Bush, then first lady publicly hugged a baby and then an adult with AIDS.    That was 1989.  Years had passed.  The public still had an overwhelming fear connected to this disease.

In the earlier 1980's another of my closest friends bagged his MD and became a medical researcher.  As an intern or in his residency he had been treating patients with AIDS.  He joined a firm that was attacking the AIDS virus and ways to treat it via  a method that had fairly recently been developed and perfected.   The company was led by the PHD who had perfected this method and was funded by Venture Capitalists which also included corporate monies from various Pharmaceutical and other med oriented businesses.  My friend was close with the president and his wife and I dated the founder/Presidents sister. 

During that period I learned a lot about the scientific community, its efforts to spread information and knowledge and the funding of research.   Overwhelmingly the bulk of the money HAD to come from the Feds.  The Private world neither had the money to fully fund the science and the effort was very risky.   Over modern American history the Feds have funded many projects that ultimately proved valuable, ie Airplanes, Jets, large scale computers,  the internet, etc etc etc. 

The politics of the "80's severely limited the money and hence the research into addressing and searching for cures, medicines and antidotes for AIDS/HIV.   There were endless roads to go down.  There were researchers available.  There wasn't enough funding. 

Had more money gone into this research earlier, more avenues would have been tested and explored.   The likelihood was that the medicines that resulted in "cocktail drugs" that kept HIV from progressing to AIDS MIGHT have been discovered earlier.  Possibly a couple of years earlier.

A lot of people might have died because of those political considerations.  I can never describe the circumstances as connected to luck.  Crappy heartless politics contributed to many deaths. 

Come to think of it this administration hates science.  Funding is dropping in a wide variety of areas.   Many will die. 

Sounds like an argument of intentional neglect.  No luck in that.

[DaveO]

1 hour ago, dcs said:

Sounds like an argument of intentional neglect.  No luck in that.

Intentional neglect. I consider that an apt description