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New AIDS Research May Be Big Step Toward Developing Vaccine

Oct 30, 2007 08:57 PM

Research by a UA professor shows AIDS arrived in the US twelve years earlier than originally thought.

Findings by Dr. Michael Worobey, based on genetic codes taken from archived blood samples of early AIDS patients, reveal the disease came to the US from Haiti in 1969.

"That doesn't necessarily mean that it was a Haitian immigrant that brought the virus over," explains Worobey. "It could have been an American who traveled to Haiti."

In any event, the research sheds light on how the virus mutates, and scientists can get a better idea of how it all originated and how it migrated across the globe.

It opens the door for more research toward a vaccine, in that it simplifies things for scientists.

"Each location might have one or tow strains well into the future rather than 10 or 20 or 30," adds Worobey.

Since it was discovered in the US in 1981, the World Health Organization estimates the disease has killed 25-million people worldwide.

Additionally, 38.6-million may be living with the disease.