AIDS

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monia (Pneumocystis carinii - the killer in half of all AIDS patients), and otherwise rare malignant tumours (such as Kaposi's sarcoma.)

Cofactors may play a crucial contributory role:
What prompts the dormant viral genes suddenly to burst into action and start destroying the immune system is one os the central unsolved challenges about AIDS. Some scientists speculate that HIV replication may be set off by cofactors or transactivators that stimulate or disturb the immune system. Such triggers may be genetically determined proteins in someone's system, or foreign substances from other infecting organisms - such as syphilis, chlamydia, gonorrhea, HTLV-1 (leukemia), herpes, or CMV (cytomegalovirus) - which somehow awaken the HIV virus. The assumption is that once HIV replication gets going, the lymphocyte destruction cripples the entire immune system. Recent British research suggest that some people may have a serum protein that helps them resist HIV while others may have one that makes them genetically more prone to it by facilitating viral p...