Miami Herald - Friday, October 19, 1984

The report in the journal Science marks the first time scientists say they isolated the suspect virus from semen. This supports the suggestion that sexual transmission is a primary route for AIDS.

Researchers at two hospitals in Boston that are associated with the Harvard Medical School, plus the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Md., said their work also strengthens growing evidence that the virus is the cause of AIDS.

The incurable disease destroys the body's infection-fighting immune system. About 6,400 cases of AIDS have been reported in the United States since 1981, and 45 percent of the patients have died.

The suspect virus, usually called human T-cell leukemia virus or HTLV-3, was identified earlier this year by a cancer institute team headed by Dr. Robert C. Gallo. A group at the Institute Pasteur in France initially isolated a closely related, if not identical, virus called lymphadenopathy-associated virus, or LAV.

Groups at high risk of getting AIDS in the United States include promiscuous male homosexuals, hemophiliacs who use blood products to correct clotting deficiencies and intravenous drug abusers.

The report said that despite the presence of HTLV-3, the 30-year-old Boston man tested had no symptoms of the deadly illness.

The man, who has been evaluated at the hospital every three months since June 1983, is consistently normal in every aspect. However, said the report, doctors found antibodies to the virus in all five blood serum samples drawn over that period.

"It is unknown why one HTLV-3 carrier remains well while another develops AIDS," the report said.

Dr. Martin Hirsch of the infectious disease unit at Massachusetts General Hospital said at a news conference in Boston that the virus most likely is transmitted by anal intercourse.

He said the study "simply confirms feelings we've had for a long time."

In the same issue of Science, researchers at the National Cancer Institute and New England Deaconess Hospital formally reported finding HTLV-3 in the saliva of six healthy homosexuals considered at risk for AIDS and 10 with early symptoms of the disease.

But Dr. Jerome Groopman, co-author of the study, said "one should not jump to the conclusion saliva is an important means of transmission of either the virus or AIDS. The overwhelming evidence is that it is not, particularly in a household setting or from casual contact."

The scientists noted that the elusive virus was found only in fresh semen cell cultures less than 12 days old.
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