Gaëtan Dugas

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Gaëtan Dugas
Born February 20, 1953(1953-02-20)
Died March 30, 1984 (aged 31)
Quebec City, Quebec
Occupation Flight attendant
Known for Alleged Patient Zero for AIDS

Gaëtan Dugas (February 20, 1953–March 30, 1984) was a French-Canadian who worked for Air Canada as a flight attendant.[1] Dugas became notorious as the alleged Patient Zero for AIDS.

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[edit] Patient Zero?

A study published in the American Journal of Medicine in 1984 traced many of New York City's early HIV infections to an unnamed infected homosexual male flight attendant. Epidemiologists incorrectly hypothesized that Dugas carried the virus out of Africa and introduced it into the Western homosexual community.[2]

Dugas was featured prominently in Randy Shilts's book And the Band Played On, which documented the outbreak of AIDS in the United States. Shilts portrayed Gaëtan Dugas as having almost sociopathic behavior, by allegedly intentionally infecting, or at least recklessly endangering, others with the virus. Dugas was described as being a charming, handsome sexual athlete, who, according to his own estimation, averaged hundreds of sex partners a year. He claimed to have had over 2,500 sexual partners across North America since becoming sexually active in 1972.[3] As a flight attendant Dugas was able to travel the globe, at little cost, to such early HIV epicenters as Los Angeles, New York, Paris, London, and San Francisco. Being diagnosed with Kaposi's Sarcoma in June 1980, and after being warned that this could be caused and spread by a sexually transmitted virus, Dugas refused to stop having unprotected sex, claiming that he could do what he wanted with his body. He allegedly informed certain sex partners that he had the "gay cancer" and perhaps they would get it too.

Back in the bathhouse, when the moaning stopped, the young man rolled over on his back for a cigarette. Gaëtan Dugas reached up for the lights, turning up the rheostat slowly so his partner's eyes would have time to adjust. He then made a point of eyeing the purple lesions on his chest. "Gay cancer", he said, almost as if he were talking to himself. "Maybe you'll get it too."[4]

Dugas died in Quebec City on March 30, 1984 as a result of kidney failure caused by continual AIDS-related infections.[5]

[edit] Analysis and criticism

Genetic analysis of HIV provides some support for the Patient Zero theory. But some allege that Dugas probably was not exclusively responsible for the initial spread of the virus in the United States, as he was believed to be part of a cluster of homosexual men who traveled frequently, were extremely sexually active, and died of AIDS at a very early stage in the epidemic (around 1980–1982).[6]

However, a number of authorities have since voiced reservations about the implications of the CDC Patient Zero study, and characterisations of Dugas as being "responsible" for single-handedly bringing HIV to such places as San Francisco or Los Angeles. While Shilts's book does not make such an allegation, the rumour, due to a misunderstanding of the proper interpretation of the early HIV patient cluster study, became difficult to eradicate. Andrew R. Moss debunked the story in the New York Review of Books.[7]

A more recent work published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on November 1, 2007 dismisses this patient zero hypothesis and claims that AIDS transited from Africa to Haiti in 1966 and from Haiti to the United States in 1969.[8][9]

[edit] Cultural references

The 1993 Canadian musical/comedy/drama film Zero Patience uses the theory of Dugas' being Patient Zero as its basis (largely ridiculing this theory in the process). The film does not identify Dugas by name, naming the character "Zero," although Zero like Dugas was a French-Canadian flight attendant.

The 1993 American made-for-TV docudrama And the Band Played On features Gaëtan Dugas as a side character in the film. He is portrayed by Jeffrey Nordling.

[edit] See also

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ (French) "La découverte de la maladie — Sida, les premières années" (Discovering the illness — AIDS, the first years), Radio-Canada, 17 January 1992
  2. ^ Auerbach, D.M.; W.W. Darrow, H.W. Jaffe, and J.W. Curran (1984). "Cluster of cases of the acquired immune deficiency syndrome. Patients linked by sexual contact". The American Journal of Medicine 76 (3): 487-92. 
  3. ^ Gladwell, Malcolm (2000). The Tipping Point. Little Brown, 21. ISBN 0-316-34662-4. 
  4. ^ Randy Shilts. And the Band Played On, page 198. ISBN 0312241356 [1]
  5. ^ Shilts, Randy (1988). And The Band Played On. Penguin, 439. ISBN 0-14-011130-1. 
  6. ^ Kuiken, C; Thakallapalli R, Esklid A, de Ronde A (2000 Nov 1). "Genetic analysis reveals epidemiologic patterns in the spread of human immunodeficiency virus". American Journal of Epidemiology 152 (9): 814-22. Los Alamos National Laboratory. 
  7. ^ Moss, Andrew R. "AIDS Without End", The New York Review of Books, December 8, 1988, retrieved December 2, 2006
  8. ^ AIDS virus invaded U.S. from Haiti: study
  9. ^ The emergence of HIV/AIDS in the Americas and beyond.

[edit] External links