When healthy young gay men began dying of a rash of rare diseases in 1981, it sparked a panic that soon spread beyond the gay community.
The underlying cause would soon be identified as Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome, and the AIDS crisis was underway. While 1981 marked the first time that AIDS entered the national consciousness, it had been circulating beneath the radar for some time. By the time it was “discovered,” thousands of people had likely already been infected, creating a pandemic just waiting to emerge.
Now, researchers from the University of Arizona and the University of Cambridge say that they have dated when the most common North American strain of HIV, the disease that leads to AIDS, arrived in the U.S. and tracked its spread across the country. In doing so, they claim to have cleared the name of the infamous Patient 0, a flight attendant often blamed for ...
