When was AIDS discovered and who discovered it?

tragic_flawed

It was discovered in 1984 by Dr. Gallo. http://library.thinkquest.org/03oct/01335/en/txt/discovery.html Apr 22 07, 5:45 AM

worksafe

Direct quote from http://aidshistory.nih.gov/discovery_of_HIV/index.html In 1984, research groups led by Dr. Gallo, Dr. Luc Montagnier at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, and Dr. Jay Levy at the University of California, San Francisco, all identified a retrovirus as the cause of AIDS. Each group called the virus by a different name: HTLV-III, LAV, and ARV, respectively. As has happened many times in scientific history, contention emerged about who had been first. Dr. Luc Montagmier of the Pasteur Institute reported isolating a new retrovirus, LAV, in May of 1983. While stating that LAV was associated with AIDS, no claim was made that LAV was the cause of AIDS. The oldest confirmed case of AIDS is of an African tribesman died of a mysterious disease in 1959 in a clinic in Leopoldville, Belgian Congo - what is now Kinshasa. The African man had first turned up at the clinic with symptoms somewhat resembling sickle cell anemia. Doctors kept samples of his blood - and decades later, Ho's team carefully analyzed it. The genetic analysis of the blood shows clear signs of the AIDS virus. Apr 22 07, 5:46 AM