Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1993. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
San Francisco Chronicle - Wednesday, December 1, 1993
David Perlman, Chronicle Science Editor
At least six non-HIV cases of the lesions have been found in the Bay Area, according to Dr. Marcus A. Conant, the dermatologist at the University of California in San Francisco who has studied Kaposi's sarcoma since the beginning of the AIDS epidemic. Dozens more cases have been found elsewhere in the country, Conant said.
The first eight cases of Kaposi's in uninfected gay men were reported in January 1990 by Dr. Alvin Friedman-Kien, a New York AIDS specialist. At the same time, researchers at the federal Centers for Disease Control suggested that the lesions might be caused by an unknown infectious agent transmitted by sexual contact among gay and bisexual men. Both those reports appeared in the international medical journal Lancet, published in England.
In response to recent reports of more cases, Conant told The Chronicle yesterday that he believes that the unknown microbe may infect the alimentary canal of young men whose immune systems are already damaged and who might transmit the organism through oral-anal contact.
At present, Conant is treating three patients for Kaposi's sarcoma, and although all have tested positive for antibodies to HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, one was a recent organ transplant patient who had been given drugs designed to suppress the immune system and prevent rejection of the transplant.
In the early days of the AIDS epidemic, Conant noted, Kaposi's sarcoma afflicted more than 60 percent of all patients, while today the purple lesions are seen in barely 15 percent of patients with AIDS. In Africa, however, the disease is widespread among men, women and even children without AIDS. "The epidemiological evidence is overwhelming that this is an infectious disease that is not caused by HIV," Conant said.
A news program last night on KPIX-TV quoted Dr. Anthony Fauci, AIDS chief at the National Institutes of Health, as saying, "I would not be totally surprised if we found out that KS is caused by a combination of things. Maybe by an agent that at this point is unrecognized."
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