In most diseases, we can count on the presence of antibodies as proof positive of infection. Thus, the usual test for AIDS registers the presence of antibodies and not the virus itself. But, researchers at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, in Baltimore, have discovered four AIDS victims in a group of 1000, who seem to have lost their AIDS antibodies but not the AIDS virus itself. Curiously, two of the four later lost the AIDS virus, too. It is possible that the AIDS virus is not really "lost" but merely hiding out somewhere, perhaps in the brain where tests of circulating blood cannot detect it.
(Anonymous; "Antibodies Can Disappear from Infected People," New Scientist, p. 4l, June 9, 1988.)
Comment. Another possibility, of course, is that of a spontaneous cure. Whatever the answer, AIDS is a tricky disease.
Reference. The AIDS debate is covered in considerable detail in BHH14-BHH22 in our catalog: Biological Anomalies: Humans II. Details here.
