San Francisco Chronicle - Monday, August 3, 1992

The report, which is being published this month in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and was submitted by Dr. Sudhir Gupta of the University of California at Irvine, has stirred public fear that a potentially fatal virus may be transmitted from person to person and through the nation's blood supply.

Dr. Ludwik Gross, the 88-year-old National Academy of Sciences member from New York who sponsored Gupta's report in the science academy's proceedings, now says he has second thoughts about having done so.

Gross said in an interview that he "wanted to brake the scare" that resulted from publicity about the report and allay "unwarranted conclusions" that led the public to fear that an AIDS-like virus was on the loose.

AIDS LINK UNCERTAIN

"Too much has been made of the finding," he said, adding that he doubts the illnesses discussed in the report have any link to AIDS.

Gross' caution adds an unusual twist to the bizarre tale of mysterious AIDS-like cases that was recounted last month at an international AIDS conference in Amsterdam. There American and European scientists spoke about a few dozen cases of an AIDS-like illness among individuals who showed no evidence of infection with HIV-1 or HIV-2.

Preliminary reports from three scientists hinting at detection of a possible new virus among such cases aroused wide public concern.

Given the alarming reaction to Gupta's paper, Gross said that he would prefer now not to have sponsored it but that he would not withdraw his support because "there is no way I could do that."

Summarizing his reservations about the significance of Gupta's findings, Gross predicted that "in three years we won't hear anything about it; it'll be gone."

DOUBTS SHARED

Dr. Luc Montagnier, the French researcher who played crucial roles in the discovery of the two viruses that cause AIDS, HIV-1 and HIV-2, said in an interview at the Pasteur Institute here that he shares Gross' concern and doubts.

"It's interesting work, and it should have been published, but I don't see why there has been so much excitement built up around it," Montagnier said. He said the link to an AIDS-like syndrome "is the weakest point; there is no evidence of such an association."

Gross said he had decided to exercise a privilege of membership in the National Academy of Sciences in introducing Gupta's paper to the proceedings after the findings were reviewed by two independent researchers. Although the reviewers expressed reservations about Gupta's technique and scientific controls, they recommended publication because the findings were fascinating.

Gupta reported that he had detected a virus unlike any of the known human retroviruses in a 66-year-old woman with an AIDS-like illness. Her only apparent risk factor was a blood transfusion she received in 1949 or 1950. Gupta said he had also found the virus in the woman's 38-year-old, healthy daughter.

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