Subject: Broader Sources Of AIDS Exposure Indicated in Study Date: Published: 4/17/85 90 lines Source: Wall Street Journal. Copyright Dow Jones Inc. Broader Sources Of AIDS Exposure Indicated in Study --- Report on African Families Finds Intimate Contact Isn't Only Transmitter --- By Marilyn Chase Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal ATLANTA -- A study by a doctor from the Centers for Disease Control indicates that people may be exposed to the AIDS virus even without sexual contact or blood transfusions. The study of 90 households in an African community found that people living under the same roof with AIDS patients were three to four times more likely to have a positive blood test for the AIDS antibody as those living with healthy persons. Presence of the AIDS antibody indicates that a person has been exposed to the virus that causes acquired immune deficiency syndrome, and that the immune system has begun producing the antibody in response. Presence of the antibody may indicate that a person is a carrier of the AIDS virus, but doesn't mean the person has or will have the disease. However, Jonathan Mann, who conducted the study, warned that because of overcrowding, primitive sanitation and cultural differences in the households studied, the report's conclusions don't necessarily apply to industrialized societies. Also, Dr. Mann distinguished the prolonged household contact examined in his study from "casual social contact" such as a handshake or sneeze. Prolonged contact might include "big blood exposures" in an exchange of saliva, or during what Dr. Mann called "micro-transfusions of daily living," such as a mother kissing her child's scraped knee. He dismissed incest as a major factor in the study. The study, presented at the International Conference on AIDS here, surveyed households in Kinshasa, Zaire, comparing 46 homes with AIDS patients and 44 homes with healthy residents. Dr. Mann then examined 204 housemates of the AIDS patients and 157 housemates of the healthy control group. "We found 17% of people in AIDS-case households were positive for AIDS antibody versus 4% of control-group households," Dr. Mann said. Even excluding the spouses of AIDS patients, he said, the contrast remains striking: 11% had the antibody in the AIDS households, compared with 4% in the control group. But even if AIDS can be transmitted without sexual contact or blood transfusions, Dr. Mann said, the study indicates that AIDS isn't spread through casual contact. He pointed out that despite two years of living with AIDS victims, 89% of the non-spousal housemates didn't have the AIDS antibody. Presence of the antibody was determined by a test like that being used by U. S. blood banks to screen donors. Dr. Mann attached two major caveats to his report. "First, our study can't yet distinguish between person-to-person transmission (through saliva, for example) and shared environmental risk factors, like unsterile needles at the local clinic or bloodsucking insects," he said. He plans to research that question in the next phase of the study. "Second, you can't generalize from our study of a developing country to industrialized nations of Europe and America," he said. Also, AIDS victims in Africa are 20 to 40 years old and are split 50-50 between men and women; heterosexual relations are a major way in which the disease is spread in Africa. In contrast, more that 70% of the 9,608 victims in the U. S. to date are homosexual men. But heterosexual transmission is increasing in the U. S., and Dr. Mann said this makes it imperative for scientists here to keep close watch on AIDS in Africa. The study was called provocative and alarmist by some health officials and U. S. gay-rights leaders who feel it could cause undue alarm about the disease. "There's a lot of hysteria out there already," said Nancy Roth of the Gay Rights National Lobby. James Curran, head of the centers' AIDS program, reiterated the centers' position that AIDS is spread only by intimate sexual or blood-to-blood contact. (This article is made available here by Dow Jones Co. for the personal and non-commercial use of callers to this bbs, in the hope that it will be of some help to those who are suffering from the disease and others who are seeking to help them.)