Thursday, June 02, 2011

June 5, 1981

Thirty years ago this Sunday, the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report published an article about five young men in Los Angeles who had been sickened by a type of pneumonia. This was the first scientific account of what would later be called human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV. "The occurrence of pneumocystosis in these 5 previously healthy individuals without a clinically apparent underlying immunodeficiency is unusual," notes the report.

Since that day...
594,496 Americans have died of AIDS
1 million Americans and 33 million worldwide are living with HIV

Source: CDC, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report

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