Word: hiv
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Even before the appearance of protease inhibitors, there were signs that younger people were shrugging off the danger of AIDS. On average, half of new HIV infections in the U.S. occur in people under the age of 25, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Doctors talk about a rising incidence of HIV-positive teenage girls, who get the virus from infected men. They talk about a "second wave" among younger gay men. For those over, say, 35, tending to a sick friend or being tended has been a nearly universal experience. For those in their...
Some drug companies are finally seeking approval from the Food and Drug Administration for a protease inhibitor suitable for children. Meanwhile, desperate parents have embarked on risky trials of their own. Juan Carlos--he doesn't want his last name used--is a Colombian who lives in Miami. Though HIV positive, he's in good health. His five-year-old daughter, who also carries the virus, is not. Three months ago, she lay helpless in a local hospital. In just two weeks her weight dropped from 32 to 22 lbs. Even so, her father could not find a doctor...
...despair of parents, the new drugs are being denied for now to most HIV-positive children, because testing for pediatric use is incomplete. The drug companies that conduct the tests have been slow to move. Properly so, insist the companies, saying it was prudent to experiment first on adults. Their critics believe the industry neglects pediatric AIDS because children under 12 are a small market in all senses. Since 1981, only 7,200 have been diagnosed as having AIDS...
...infected, before the immune system is too weakened to rebound. But they also acknowledge that the people who appear to be responding best to the new drugs are those who never used earlier ones. "Knowing that, where do you put your marbles?" asks Stephen Follansbee, medical director of the HIV Institute at Davies Medical Center in San Francisco. "It's tough, because no one's got a crystal ball...
...protease inhibitors give rise to a small social revolution, they will also produce an upheaval in purely personal relations. For instance, AIDS opened a quiet split between positive and negative men, within which the new drugs may add another fine fracture. "In the past, HIV-negative guys didn't want to date positive guys," says Jim Brudner, an AIDS activist in New York. "Now positive guys with 500 T cells don't want to date guys with fewer. Everybody is terrified of becoming a caretaker for a partner who gets sick...