Really A Question For Epidemiologists, I Suppose...

[sandyRoe]

If the AIDS-HIV virus had developed in the 19th Century what would its effects have been on human populations?

[EDDIE51]

^^ It would have arrived in Europe but its arrival would have been many years later. Also it would have spread very much more slowly with out the 'Gay revolution' that made highly promiscuous homosexuality acceptable.

[Bazile]

//homosexual male airline steward //

Aren't they all ?

[Peter Pedant]

This is not a question for epidemiologists
but more for Mystic Meg

There were large epidemics in the Victorian times and they wiped out large populations

Cholera UK 1832, 1856
Cholera Hong Kong 1896
Yellow fever panama 1900

[Peter Pedant]

// Also it would have spread very much more slowly with out the 'Gay revolution' that made highly promiscuous homosexuality acceptable.//

oh dear dear perpetuating the myth that this is a gay disease so leave it be and all that will happen is that a section of the population will wipe itself out.

Doing nothing apparently cost America $1tn is health care costs ( yes that was one trillion )

the refutation is that this model doesnt work in Africa where the majority of the cases are.

[jno]

of course it was a gay disease, PP - high levels of promiscuity among heterosexuals are unknown. At least in the west - there's no telling what those caddish Africans get up to.

The Patient Zero theory is regarded with suspicion these days. More likely that it was transmitted from an infected monkey being killed or eaten, and that it happened decades before the swinging seventies.

[Peter Pedant]

Bad mistakes were made jno from the proposition you have stated

bad as in expensive ( one trillion mentioned above )
if you have time and inclination read
And the band played on
by the unlikely named Randy Shilts

this concerns the disastrous policy of Ronald Reagans admin in ignoring it for political reasons

and my God his successors have paid and paid and paid

[jno]

people like to have a scapegoat to point the finger at, much as the Mail does, so the Patient Zero was what everyone wanted to believe.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ga%C3%ABtan_Dugas

[EDDIE51]

Whether the 'patient one' theory is correct or not , no one can dispute that the rapid spread of the disease in the early 1980s was due to the massive increase in multi partner, unprotected and often anonymous anal sex within the 'Gay' community of the USA and other places. AIDS is far less easily spread by vaginal intercourse ( less likely not impossible) as there is less chance of direct blood to blood contact. The reason being that the vagina is designed for intercourse whereas the anus is designed for other use and is more easily damaged by sex.

[sandyRoe]

So, it wouldn't have been as bad as the Black Death which is thought to have killed more than 30% of the population in the 14th Century?

[EDDIE51]

^^ you just had to be near someone who was infected to catch the plague , to get AIDS you have to have had unprotected sex with them.
( and far more likely if it was anal sex rather than vaginal sex. )

[EDDIE51]

^^ Did you realise that the children's rhyme' Ring a Roses' is about the 'Black Death'?
The Ring a roses was a reference to the red rash that appeared on a victims skin. The 'pocket full of posies ' was a reference to the idea that the sweet smell of flowers could stop you catching the plague and the a'tissue a'tissue all fall down was a reference to the sneezing that was a symptom of the disease and 'all fall down ' was the death of victims that followed the sneezing part.