Subject: AIDS Virus Spread May Be Slowing, 2 Studies Indicate
Date: Published: 5/18/87 72 lines
Source:  WALL STREET JOURNAL. Copyright Dow Jones & Co. Inc. 

   A Deadly Epidemic:  
   AIDS Virus Spread
   May Be Slowing,
   2 Studies Indicate
    ---
   By Marilyn Chase
   Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

   The spread of infection by the AIDS virus may be leveling
 off in some segments of the American population -- among
them, San Francisco homosexuals and U. S. military recruits.
   San Francisco's public health department says the increase
in new infections from the AIDS virus among the city's
homosexual men has slowed to a rate of about 1% a year from
about 12% to 14% annually during the peak years of its spread
from 1980 through 1982.  The figures were obtained from stored
blood samples taken for a 10-year study of San Francisco gay
 men in a hepatitis-B survey.
The San Francisco study roughly parallels a report last
week from the U. S. Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta,
which tentatively suggested that the infection level among
 military recruits may be stabilizing at about 1.5 per 1,000.
The study, carried in the CDC publication Morbidity and
Mortality Weekly Report, looked at applicants for military
service during the 15 months from Oct. 1985 through Dec. 
1986.
   The two pieces of welcome news may indicate the success of
some public education programs, although in the case of the
military, it may merely mean the avoidance of induction
centers by those who fear they are infected.
   And it doesn't mean a waning of the epidemic anytime soon,
because the volume of AIDS cases for the next few years is
already programmed -- "locked in" by the number of people who
are already infected with the deadly virus but haven't yet
shown symptoms.  Because of the long incubation period, those
infected with the virus often don't become ill for several
years.
   As of last Monday, the CDC reported 35,518 cases of
acquired immune deficiency syndrome, which is spread by
blood, shared needles and sexual contact.  About 1.5 million
Americans are believed to carry the virus.  San Francisco
studies indicate that 60% of those infected with the virus
have progressed to AIDS or AIDS-related complex after seven
years.  AIDS-related complex, or ARC, is an earlier phase of
the disease.
   George Lemp, chief of AIDS surveillance for the San
Francisco Public Health Department, said the American public
should welcome the new data cautiously, and without
abandoning current education programs.
   "Massive education and public awareness should level off
the rate of new infection," Mr. Lemp said.  "It's been shown
in San Francisco gay men that the new-infection rate has
plummeted since they began practicing safe sex.  Education and
community involvement is very effective in changing behavior,
for example in reducing numbers of partners and in using
condoms."
   However, he noted, "we expect the number of cases of
disease to continue to increase because there are a large
number of people infected in prior years who will continue to
progress to AIDS. " Because of the long incubation period of
the virus, he explained, the majority of infected people were
exposed "before the disease was ever heard of."

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