Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1996. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
The Miami Herald, Inc.; Saturday, September 28, 1996
Liz Balmaseda, Herald Columnist
He died Wednesday at 29, his body purpled by Kaposi's sarcoma. He was not only a patient in the eighth-floor AIDS unit, he also was an energetic volunteer there, famous for his inspirational talks.
Just a few days ago, at his weakest, he delivered powerful words of hope to his fellow patients.
"It is becoming chronic and manageable," he is remembered as saying about AIDS, "so there is hope. Hang in there. There is life after HIV." On Friday morning, the international AIDS research doctors Robert Gallo and Jean-Claude Chermann, co-discoverers of HIV, delivered a similar message to a conference room of physicians and AIDS workers.
They talked about encouraging discoveries in their race against a virus that is constantly mutating.
Gallo, controversial for his role in discovering HIV, talked about how he and his colleagues at the Institute of Human Virology at the University of Maryland in Baltimore have identified natural substances in the body that block the virus. These natural chemicals, called chemokines, might lead to the development of new vaccines or drugs.
He hinted at significant new research soon to be published.
Chermann, who was chief of research at the Pasteur Institute in Paris when a team of other scientists isolated the AIDS-causing virus in 1983, discussed his research on HIV-infected patients who produce certain protective antibodies that allow them to survive years without treatment.
"I'm very confident in science," Chermann said after his talk Friday. "But not in people. What surprises me the most is how people are still getting infected. We know all the routes of transmission, yet people are still getting infected."
The session was a warm-up to an all-day comprehensive conference on AIDS put on today by Mercy Hospital's Special Immunology Services at the Miami Beach Convention Center. It is only the fourth Living with HIV conference hosted by Mercy's Dr. Corklin Steinhart, the HIV center director, and his staff.
But already, with the presence of Chermann and Gallo and other respected researchers, the conference has taken on an international dimension. Its ambitious reach is only a reflection of Steinhart's approach to AIDS medicine. He is a physician who can travel the labyrinths of academia and never lose his love of humanity. This was evident as he escorted the scientists on a tour of the HIV center and the AIDS unit.
For Living with HIV: Time, Healing and Discovery, he has brought together a range of voices. Today's morning session not only includes the co-discoverers of the HIV virus, but also Jeanne White, whose young son Ryan changed the face of AIDS when he died six years ago. They will be joined by Ada Ayala, a 73-year-old widow living with AIDS in Miami. One very notable person will not be there this morning, although his memory has been invoked. Steinhart dedicated this conference to Alvaro Funes, in the name of hope.
The fourth annual Living with HIV conference runs from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. today at the Miami Beach Convention Center, Hall D. Admission is free.
CAPTION: photo: Robert GALLO
Published by: The Miami Herald, Inc.; a Knight Ridder publication. One Herald Plaza, Miami, FL 33132-1693
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