I heard the news today oh boy.
In this News Report that was accompanied on-air with more information I was thrown back to a time that I never want to visit again except in memory. We have a new strain of AIDS that is deadly and drug resistant called 3 DCR and it could hurl many of us right back to our lives circa 1983 when the `gay cancer' got a name.
New York City authorities are alarmed about a never-before-seen strain of HIV, because of the speed it takes hold of the body and its resistance to almost all AIDS medications. Doctors at St. Vincents and across the city are on the lookout for this new viral strain. The first and right now only person infected with this new strain is a New York City man in his 40's. He was diagnosed with HIV in December - today he has full-blown AIDS - a two-month span that normally takes 10-years or more.
In the on-air version they reported that this man in his 40's had unprotected sex while using Crystal Meth in December and in less than 8 weeks has full-blown AIDS that doesn't respond to treatment. I'm not very comforted by the fact that only one man has been diagnosed because someone infected him and then someone infected that guy etc. and how many others have been exposed in the meantime?
Reports on PlanetOut today add that this strain is thought to be drug resistant to 3 out or 4 treatments but that would basically mean the same thing because most people don't tolerate the drugs well because of adverse side effects. Losing 3 out of 4 options would make many have to choose between death and dibilitation.
With our government now far to the right of Reagan and the Evangelicals telling us we don't deserve rights there will be fierce pressure not to fully fund this new strain (unless it ends up threatening the blood supply).
Jay Dobkin, SUNY-Downstate Medical Center: "Many of us up here remember the dark days before there was any effective treatment for HIV and I think this case this morning should at least be a reminder that those days could come back."
Roy Gulick, Weill Cornell Medical College: "People who have HIV infection need to continue to prevent acquiring additional viral infections from other people who may carry other strains."
Dennis DeLeon, Latino Commission on AIDS: "I was dreading this day because I knew this day would come, when multi-drug resistance strains of the virus would begin to enter the community."
I know just how they feel. I lost a lover and a best friend plus many others and refuse to go gently into this bad night.