The Relationship Between the Human Immunodeficiency Virus and the Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome: Executive Summary (Draft)

DRAFT

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE HUMAN IMMUNODEFICIENCY VIRUS
AND
THE ACQUIRED IMMUNODEFICIENCY SYNDROME
Executive Summary
November 1994
The acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) is characterized by the progressive loss of
CD4+ T cells, leading to severe immunosuppression and constitutional disease, neurologic
complications, and opportunistic infections and cancers that rarely occur in people with intact
immune function. Although the precise mechanisms leading to CD4+ T cell depletion and the
resulting immune dysfunction of AIDS are not fully known, abundant epidemiologic, virologic
and immunologic data clearly indicate that infection with the human immunodeficiency virus
(HIV) is the underlying cause of AIDS.
This document summarizes the evidence that HIV causes AIDS, and briefly addresses the
commonly stated claims of those who assert that HIV is not the cause of AIDS.
THE SCOPE OF THE HIV/AIDS EPIDEMIC
1. Between June 1981 and June 30, 1994, 401,749 cases of AIDS, including
243,423 AIDS-related deaths were reported to the U.S. Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention (CDC).
2. AIDS is the leading cause of death among men aged 25 to 44 in the United
States, and the fourth leading cause of death among women in the same age
group.
3. Worldwide, 985,119 cases of AIDS were reported to the World Health
Organization (WHO) through June 1994. However, because of a lack of systematic surveillance and reporting in some geographic areas, these figures
represent a small proportion of the true world total. The WHO estimates that
more than 4 million cases of AIDS had occurred by early 1994, and that 17
million people worldwide have been infected with HIV since the beginning of the
epidemic.
4. Between August 1993 and August 1994, the WHO estimates that 3 million
people were infected with HIV, with 1 million of the new cases in southeast
Asia.
5. By the year 2000, the WHO estimates that 30 to 40 million people will have
been infected with HIV, and that 10 million people will have developed AIDS.
The Global AIDS Policy Coalition has estimated that the real figures may be
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