The Origin of HIV/AIDS?

(NOTE: I tried to be neutral in creating this page, but some of the arguments on the origin of disease have been heated, and of course, I'm a pro-animal pro-environment person and worry about the effects of excessive laboratory research--so some of that may show in my info. I just needed to make my personal prejudices clear. I certainly think there is much to be questioned in traditional theories.)

Where does HIV come from? . . .

The Earliest Documented Cases of HIV

1966: Norway

In 1966, a widely travelled Norwegian sailor died with AIDS-like symptoms. When his blood was tested later, it turned out HIV positive.

1959? Kinshasha, Zaire/Congo?

A 1959 blood sample kept from a man living in Kinshasha in Zaire turned out to be HIV positive when tested, according to the CDC (Center for Disease Control). However,according to Laurie Garrett (1994, The Coming Plague), the CDC lost this blood sample and the positive test results were never confirmed by anyone else. However, the CDC is convinced that it has found the oldest blood to definitely test HIV positive.

1960s: St. Louis, MO, United States?

The HIV virus was never found in the blood of a Saint Louis teen who died in the 60's of AIDS-like symptoms, according to Garrett. Does this mean that with all the teen's t-cells destroyed by HIV (the teen had no t cells) that the virus died off? Or would some of the virus have remained in other cells that can also harbor HIV?

1959?: Manchester, U.K.

The HIV that researchers claimed to have found in the blood of a little-travelled sailor from Manchester, U.K., who died of AIDS-like symptoms in 1959, was most likely tainted, as it was so like a modern variety of HIV going around in laboratories, that the blood samples must have been mixed up, according to Garrett (1994).

(It's possible to mix up virus samples in testing! In fact, HIV research pioneers Dr. Robert Gallo and Dr. Luc Montaignier ended up with almost genetically identical virus samples in their research, suggesting that the samples the one had exchanged with the other had somehow contaminated the other sample. See L. Rainey, "Who Discovered HIV . . .?", in Dallas Voice. The virus isolated by Dr. Levy at the same time that Gallo and Montaignier isolated their virus, was however a different wild virus.

It is likely that if either the Manchester sailor or the Saint Louis teen had HIV, they had a variety that is not known today, a variety that has since died off or has evolved into a more modern form!

The Entry of HIV into the Blood Supply

In Africa:

Late 1960s

AIDS researcher Dr. Jay Levy tested blood samples drawn in Africa in the late 1960's, and was unable to detect HIV, again according to Laurie Garrett (1994).

Mid-to-late 1970s

Joe McCormick of the CDC (the United States Center for Disease Control) tested blood drawn in Africa in the mid-to-late 1970's and found HIV present in a small percentage of the samples.

Today

Today four countries in the southern part of Africa (Swaziland, Botswana, South Africa, and Lesotho) vie for the highest HIV infection rates in the world. (See also Wikipedia's map showing estimated prevalence rate --- not infection rate though -- of HIV in adults around the world.) HIV incidence is apparently higher in Africa's garment workers, many of these women, than it is in other population groups in Africa.

In the United States:

Early-to-mid 1970s

HIV was detected in a small percentage of samples of blood drawn from injecting drug users in the United States in the early-to-mid 1970's.

1978

The first case of HIV infection traced to blood and plasma donation in the United States was traced to blood donated in 1978, according to Garrett (1994). Unfortunately, when infected blood was discovered in the blood supply, the blood and plasma dealers began destroying records of donations/sales of blood, together with the old blood samples, so it is difficult to trace exactly when HIV was first present in blood and plasma donations in the United States, according to Garrett (1994).

Does this Mean that HIV is a Relatively New Virus? HIV could have changed and evolved recently, and older variants of it may not be detectable by tests for present-day HIV. Or HIV could have evolved relatively recently from other viruses, and entered the blood supply relatively recently. Or there may be insufficient blood samples from earlier dates, and samples may be absent of HIV though HIV may have been present in some people's blood that was not sampled. No matter which of these theories you believe, it does seem that the HIV epidemic exploded in the late 1970's and early 1980's in both Africa and the United States (and also in the Caribbean and Europe). Prior to that, it was a very rare disease!

Related Viruses

HTLV or the Human t-cell leukemia virus is another lentavirus and retrovirus -- like HIV. It may be very very distantly related to HIV, and most scientists think it is older than HIV. HTLV was originally found in Japan, Melanesia, Kenya, Italy, the Caribbean, and parts of the Americas (Ecuador, Bolivia, and Columbia especially). There are two varieties of HTLV. One, HTLV2, seems to be native to the Americas -- this variety is generally considered the milder variety, because it does not cause cancer in the t-cells. The other variety, HTLV1 was found initially in all the regions listed above other than the Continental Americas. The relatively mild "American" variety of HTLV (HTLV2) has now spread widely among drug users in the Southeastern United States. It may mutate and become more severe with its new opportunities to spread, according to some disease specialists (Garrett, 1994). Interestingly, the string of amino acids in the protease enzyme of the more severe variety of HTLV -- that is, HTLV1 -- is almost identical to the string of amino acids in the protease enzyme of HIV (type 1, which is the type of HIV most often associated with severe AIDS). Since viruses and bacteria can exchange strings of proteins and amino acids, did HIV1, which is otherwise more like HIV2 than it is like either variant of HTLV, get this string of proteins in an exchange with HTLV1? Was HIV1 originally the same as HIV2? Or did HIV2, with less opportunities to infect people than HIV1 had, perhaps, lose this string of proteins as it mutated and became less deadly? (Some think that the HIV virus is a 'recombinant virus' -- that its original dna recombined with dna at some point to produce the modern version of it. Recombination of genes is one way viruses evolve. Another way is simple gene mutation.)

Equine Infectious Anemia (which infects horses) and the Visna virus (which infects sheep), again both lentaviruses and retroviruses, seem to be more closely related to HIV than does HTLV. These viruses and HIV share the same structure, but have generally different proteins. They may come from a single virus family.

Take a look at HIV Web's Diagrams of the protein and gene arrangements in HIV

Or view the list of varieties of HIV and SIV at HIV Web's Subtypes of HIV

The Age of HIV

According to many researchers, HIV, which mutates, is currently mutating at a rate of about 1% a year. Thus it may have evolved from another virus about 100 years ago, given a constant rate of mutation.

However, HIV may not have mutated at a constant rate. It might have mutated faster or slower at different times, depending on circumstances! When a microbe has opportunties to spread rapidly, it may mutate faster according to research on microbes, and when it has few opportunities to spread, if may mutate more slowly.

Some things that might make HIV mutate more rapidly:

• Deforestation and the rise of cities.
• Vaccination programs in Africa and elsewhere where clean needles and syringes have not been used.
• Drug injection in the trenches of World War I and II.
• Many sex partners and a high incidence of prostitution in places like San Francisco's Chinatown in the 1920's -- where imported laborers or migrant laborers work.
• Human experimentation, which became more widespread during the Holocaust.
• Rising injecting drug use rates after the 1960's.
• Rising promiscuity.
• Crowding and poor hygiene in poorer nations, with conditions made worse by wars.

The African Hypothesis

Many researchers believe that HIV may have originated in Africa. Here is evidence that has been used in arguments, pro and con!

SIV (Simian Immunodeficiency Virus) and HIV: Did they co-evolve? Did they co-evolve in the wilderness or around cities?

Because SIV -- the Simian Immune Deficiency Virus -- which infects monkeys, is very closely related to HIV, and because some varieties of SIV can infect both humans and monkeys, researchers argue that HIV evolved from the monkey virus. However, monkey and human versions of a virus may be alike as a result of the way viruses have co-evolved with the various animal species. Dr. Jay Levy (2001) of the University of California at San Francisco's Aids Research Institute suggests that 'the predecessor of [HIV may have] . . . entered the animal kingdom and evolved with the species.' Simply because monkeys and humans are so close genetically, the viruses that attack them may also be close genetically.

It's possible that the current infectious varieties of SIV and HIV may have co-evolved monkeys and humans as a result of urban conditions. SIV and HIV varieties are closest together not in the wilderness, but around cities, where trees have been clear cut, the monkeys' habitat destroyed, and monkeys and humans left competing for the turf.

HIV and Forest Peoples/Hunters in Africa

Interestingly, according to Garrett (1994), HIV and HIV antibodies were not, at least initially, found in the Mbuti and other indigenous peoples, or traditional forest dwelling peoples of Central Africa. The rate of HIV infection however seems to be rising in these groups as they are relocated from the forest.

Right: Photo of one of the Ba'Aka people of Congo, working as a guide for the World Wildlife Fund (The above photo is from the World Wildlife Fund Summer-Fall, 2001. For more on the Ba'AKa, see "Baka: People of the Forest" and "Baka: Growing Up," by Phil Agland, narrated by Denzel Washington, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhU_3Dz9Z9g.)

Africa's forest dwellers have hunted wild monkeys for years but have had a low incidence of HIV! Monkeys are also hunted and kept in captivity for research and lab purposes. And many outbreaks of SIV have occurred in research and lab monkeys, where a large number of monkeys are caged together! But today as noted HIV is on the rise in people who previously dwelled in the forest, but have been relocated. The first case of HIV was reported in a Bushman from the Southern part of Africa in 1998, two years after relocation, according to information provided by Mount Holyoke College.

HIV, SIV, and African Green Monkeys

HIV and SIV were not found in the kidney cells of Green monkeys used in the manufacture of the polio vaccination in the 1950s. Of course, HIV and SIV do not infect the kidney cells well. And, possibly, the 1950s version of the virus was nothing like the modern virus.

Today, about half of all African Green Monkeys in the wild carry a kind of SIV. However, according to Garrett (1994), the Green monkeys in the Caribbean who were all brought from Africa in the eighteenth century all tested SIV negative! Perhaps the people who brought the monkeys luckily picked some who did not have SIV. But perhaps SIV was rarer in monkeys in the eighteenth century than it is today! Or again, perhaps it was not anything like any modern virus.

Do Monkeys and Other Chimps Get Sick from SIV?

Some kinds of SIV considered "native" to certain species of African monkeys seem not to make these monkeys that sick -- it's argued that the monkeys have developed resistance! For example, a variety of SIV that is like HIV2 does not make sooty mangabeys too sick -- though there is some change in their cells; however, Asian Macaques do get sick from this variety of SIV and do not seem to have any resistance. (It's generally agreed that the AIDS epidemic reached Asia later than it reached Africa, but of course, it also reached Asia later than it reached Europe, or the U.S.) Does this mean that the ancient ancestor of HIV was not endemic in monkeys at the time the macaques and related species went separate ways, at least not endemic enough to lead to resistance?

Many strains of SIV that infect non-human primates in Africa (and do not appear to cause severe illness) are more like HIV2, a variety of HIV common in West Africa that has (so far) not been as severe as HIV1-- the HIV most of us associate with severe AIDS! But chimps do get sick from SIV when SIV is more like HIV!

It's also worth noting that resistance to microbes may evolve faster in many animal species, simply because many animals go through the generations a bit faster than we do!

Geographic Distribution of HIV Strains in Africa, and Distribution of SIV in Chimps

Some researchers argue that the presence of HIV in Africa can be explained in terms of the habitats of the non-human primates who are the original carriers: sooty mangabeys live in West Africa where HIV2 is prevalent, and some of the mangabeys are infected with an HIV2-like strain; chimps infectred with an HIV1-like strain have been found in East Africa where HIV1 is prevalent. But chimpanzee habitat (shown at Bossou's Chimp World web site) does not extend to in South Africa, where HIV1 is also prevalent. It's clear that many more HIV varieties exist in Africa than elsewhere -- but did these varieties evolve in Africa -- or elsewhere, and then just find a better place to spread in Africa, while they became extinct elsewhere?

This map from PBS shows the various strains of HIV that predominate in different regions (note that other strains occur in each of these regions but do not dominate. Interestingly, according to Sundaravaradan et. al's "Role of HIV-1 subtype C envelope V3 to V5 regions in viral entry, coreceptor utilization and replication efficiency in primary T-lymphocytes and monocyte-derived macrophages"(2007, Virology Journal), the C-strain that predominates in Africa is associated with more rapid progression to AIDS and tends to take over wherever it is introduced.

Genetic Resistance to HIV in Different Groups of People

HIV infects Africans like everyone else! In fact, most people who carry genes that make their cells more resistant to the more common strain of HIV are of European ancestry, not of African ancestry. Marmor, et. al's report, "Resistance to HIV Infection" (January, 2006; Journal of Urban Health 83[1]: 5–17; reprinted online by the NIH) explains that, five-to-fifteen percent of European Caucasions have at least one mutated CCR5 receptor to the most common strain of HIV. Having two mutated receptors -- a pair -- can prevent infection by the most common strain of HIV. Africans and East Asians apparently do not have this mutation. This mutation increases in frequency from the Mediterranean to Northern Europe, and occurs also at very low frequencies in India and the Near East. However persons of African and Asian ancestry sometimes have mutated CCR2 receptors to the strain. So do Caucasians, but not as frequently. Two mutated CCR2 receptors however do not protect the person who has these from getting HIV apparently but may help to slow progression to AIDS. One mutated CCR2 receptor may not protect the person who has this mutation from HIV at all.

Immune Deficiency Viruses in Various Animal Species

Various immune deficiency viruses related to HIV infect animals, but these animals are not unique to Africa: cats, the Florida panther, lions in captivity, sheep, and cows.

Dr. Luc Montagnier of the French Institut Pasteur (who tends to believe that the precursors of HIV started exploding in Africa), reminds us that HIV may be like syphilis, another disease no one wanted to own:

The "Naples disease" (as the French called it), or the "French disease" (as everyone else called it) suddenly appeared in Europe after Columbus's expedition in 1492 . . . Blame was laid on a germ imported from America, but syphilitic lesions have recently been discovered on skeletons of Europeans dating back to well before the discovery of the New World.  (Quoted from Virus, 2000.)

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Lentaviruses

Lenta means 'slow.' Lentaviruses work slowly, and may take years to make someone sick!

Retroviruses

Retroviruses are viruses that use RNA rather than DNA.

Vaccinations, Injections, Blood Transfusions That Use Unsanitary Methods:

In poor countries, sometimes injections with reused syringes are sold by injectionists. In addition, some vaccination programs in rural areas in poor countries have not had an adequate supply of clean needles and syringes, and have reused needles and syringes. In Africa, children with sickle cell anemia have been injected with blood from adult relatives without checking for possible microbes in the blood.

In Europe, one of the earliest vaccinations--developed for one of the more ancient of the lethal diseases -- was the smallpox vaccination, invented by Edward Jenner in 1796. The initial smallpox vaccinations invented by Jenner were extracted from the lymph of horses, sheep, or cows that had cowpox; or from the lymph of humans previously vaccinated. The lymph was exposed to a 50 percent solution of glycerin and water, and nothing else. A person was vaccinated by 'making an adequate number of insertions of [the] lymph over a sufficient area.' Several other persons could then be vaccinated from the lymph of that person. This procedure was believed to be safer than procedures before Jenner introduced his vaccine, which involved injecting persons with the blood of those who had survived a bout with smallpox. By 1900, Jenner's smallpox vaccination was compulsory for British schoolchildren! The spread of several infections have been attributed, post hoc to the small pox vaccinations, according to the Encyclopaedia Britannica (1911). The procedure was made more sanitary and was ultimately rendered unecessary when smallpox was eradicated in the second half of this century.

Is There Anything Special About the Deep Woods?

Researchers do not have all the answers about HIV. However, the rainforest enriches all of us, and researchers constantly comb the rainforests -- an area with much more diverse life than most areas for new cures!
For information on biodiversity in soil, see also the Soil Food Web at http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_MEDIA/nrcs142p2_049822.jpg (the numbers of different types of organisms in healthy soil are listed at http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_MEDIA/stelprdb1237711.jpg). See http://www.blm.gov/nstc/soil/foodweb/index.html for a discussion of variety of life in the soil (which paving destroys).
One extract from a rain forest plant that is being investigated for anti-HIV properties is Calidomide (discussed in Sharon Douglass' HIV class, University of Central Florida, 2001). Other rainforest products include: cocoa (my favorite food -- it's loaded in antioxidants and is good for the blood vessels -- that is, when it's not mixed with fats), coffee (cocoa and coffee can be grown sustainably under the rainforest canopy, a canopy whose birds naturally help keep insects from bothering the trees, according to "The Sweetest Chocolate" in Country Living [February, 2003]; unfortunately, some chocolate and cacao trees are grown using clearcutting methods says the author), brazil nuts, macadamia nuts, cashews, pineapple, mangos, papayas, black pepper, LaPacho herbal teas (said to be healthful), and natural latex. Purchasing rainforest products helps to make the rainforest economically viable and keep it alive.

Above left: A Costa Rican Rainforest. Photo linked to from Barry's on-line clipart collection.

Another place for rainforests is Malaysia. Learn about the rainforest in Borneo http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/11/borneo/klum-photography at National Geographic.

Hawaii also has rainforests. Learn about Hawaii and its history and culture at About.com's story of the Waipi'o Valley or 'Valley of Kings'. Or view photos of the Hawaiian rainforest on Kauai taken by Dee Estrella and her husband! Or perhaps you would like to learn about the culture and traditional farming at East Molokai Taro Patch Farm. Or you might want to learn more about Hawaiian Ahupua'a at http://www.pacificworlds.com/nuuanu/onwards/village.cfm. Whatever site you go to, have a great virtual trip!

Evolution and Destruction of Rainforest: What You Can Do. It took somewhere between 70 and 100 million years for the rainforests of the Earth to evolve. Without intervention, the amount of rainforest on the planet Earth shrinks. In 1996, an area of rainforest the size of Florida was being destroyed every year, to provide lumber and lands for ranching, according to Peter Rillero's lesson plan, "Tropical Rainforest Education" (at ERIC, ED432438)! Rillero says that, at that rate, all the world's rainforests will be gone between 2070 and 2075 A.D.! What can you do to help stop rainforest destruction? Besides buying rainforest products or reducing beef consumption, you can buy only wood from areas where trees are saved. Home Depot and Lowes are planning to label such wood as 'good wood.' You might get your local lumber distributor to follow suit. You can also write your government leaders. Write to the president at http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact. Or, help The Rainforest Action Network.

People in the Rainforests of Africa. Some of Africa's people may have come to Africa 30,000 years ago. Analysis of the genes of people who live in Africa's forest today show evidence of some history of intermarriage wiith Bantu people however. Forest dwellers are usually short in height -- varying theories exist as to why they are short, including a theory that their short stature is linked to an altered thyroid gland which enables them to adapt to the limited resoures in the forest. Learn more about people who live in the African rainforest, and their struggles. Check out the Ogiek at Ogiek.org. The Ogiek live in Kenya. For further information about the struggles of the people and wildlife of the rainforest in Central Africa, the Dzanga-Sangha protected rainforest in Central Africa's countries. Or learn about the Bushmen who used to live in a preserve in Botswana, but have been relocated, at http://www.voanews.com/content/bushmen-of-central-kalahari-in-constant-battle-to-survive--119263609/160311.html.

Explore more sites yourself -- indiced at Rainforest Action Network's blog on Indigenous Peoples and the Rainforest. Or check out the satellite map showing the dense forested areas of Central and West Africa at Mongabay, http://www.mongabay.com/images/external/africa-satellite_unmarked.gif. Forest atlases for the African rainforest areas are available at the World Resource Institute http://www.wri.org/our-work/project/congo-basin-forest-atlases/publications, but may be slow to download (note also that the Atlas for Cameroon, where both French and English are spoken, is in English; other atlases are in French only). You can also get involved with Earthday!

Above Right: A Logger Clearcutting the Rainforest. Photo by Stephen Holt, 1999, Aigrette Photography

Interestingly, Kujo, a vine which came to this country from Japan (where it was cultivated as an aphrodisiac, or sort-of love potion), and then spread southward and took over when it got into generally frost-free regions in Florida, does not grow in Florida's deep woods. It does well in areas of low brush and clearings at the edge of the deep woods, and also very well in people's back yards, but light and plant conditions in the deep woods are (fortunately) not suitable for Kujo! Kujo climbs and strangles other plants, destroying many Florida yards, however -- but may be 'trainable,' like other vines. (I was able to keep it off of the oaks where I lived, by training it.)

Unfortunately for this country, one of its greatest resouces, its beautiful wilderness, is disappearing! When Christopher Columbus and the early settlers and explorers came here, they found forests filled with a variety of tall trees. Poet Nancy Willard writes, quoting from The Journals of Christopher Columbus,

          Even the conquerers of this country

          lifted their eyes and found

          more comely than gold: Bright green trees,

          the whole land so green, it is a pleasure to look on it,

          and the greatest wonder to see the diversity.

          During that time I walked among trees,

          The most beautiful things I had ever seen.

                    . . .

          Already the trees are a myth,

          half gods, half giants in whom nobody believes.

     --From Nancy Willard (1974), When There Were Trees, in The Carpenter of the Sun: Poems by Nancy Willard (New York: Liveright); Quotation (in italics) adapted by Nancy Willard from The Journals of Christopher Columbus, as rendered in William Carlos Williams' In the American Grain.