Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1986. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Miami Herald, - Saturday, April 19, 1986
Herald Staff
After a yearlong struggle, the 13-member panel of the International Committee on the Taxonomy of Viruses has voted to call the virus the Human Immune-Deficiency Virus, or HIV, according to several participants.
Already, however, some of the top scientists on the committee, including Dr. Robert Gallo of the National Cancer Institute, say they will not use it.
"I think the names of the virus that are already in the literature will be maintained," he said.
The name dispute is part of a wider controversy between two competing groups of American and French researchers over who discovered the virus, who proved its relationship to AIDS and who should be allowed to make and sell blood tests to screen for signs of AIDS infection.
The French group, headed by Luc Montagnier at the Institut Pasteur in Paris, has called the virus LAV (for Lymphadenopathy-Associated Virus). The National Cancer Institute laboratory led by Gallo has stood by its name, HTLV-3 (for Human T-Cell Lymphotropic Virus). A third researcher, Dr. Jay Levy of the University of California, has called it ARV (for AIDS-Related Virus).
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