GUANGZHOU - Sixty people who had claimed they were suffering from a mysterious infectious condition dubbed "HIV-Negative AIDS" have been cleared of the disease, but 48 of them tested positive for several types of pathogens.

The research was done by a team of the No 1 Affiliated Hospital of the Guangzhou Medical University and the State Key Laboratory of Respiratory Disease, between March 31 and May 3.

Sixty patients, including 52 males, whose average age was 34.2 and who came from 16 provinces and municipalities, were examined, said Zhong Nanshan, director of the Guangzhou Institute of Respiratory Diseases, who directed the research.

The sufferers had shown symptoms for periods ranging from three months to 10 years.

Among the 48 who tested positive for pathogens, 33 tested positive for epidermolysis bullosa, 12 positive for chlamydia trachomatis (CT), nine for ureaplasma urealyticum (UU), seven for neisseria gonorrhoeae (NG), eight for cytomegalovirus and one for herpes simplex virus.

Sixteen tested positive for more than one of those pathogens, which are mostly related to sexually transmitted diseases.

In the 24 examined for knee diseases, 10 showed abnormalities in their knees, and in the 38 examined for eye diseases, 20 were diagnosed with conventional eye diseases. Twelve underwent psychological tests and seven were found abnormal.

Since 2009, media reports have stated that sufferers had displayed symptoms very similar to AIDS, such as swollen lymph nodes, subcutaneous bleeding, joint pain, fatigue, night sweats and emaciation.

The Ministry of Health stated in April that there was no evidence that those people were infected by the AIDS virus.

Wu Zunyou, an AIDS expert with the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said no new viruses had been found among the alleged sufferers and they were most likely just suffering from a mental health problem often called AIDS phobia.

There is no fundamental difference between results of the research led by Zhong Nanshan and that by the Ministry of Health, said Hao Yang, deputy director of the bureau of disease prevention and control at the ministry, on Friday.

Zhong Nanshan said his team agreed with the ministry on the conclusions based on its research.

Many of the people involved in Zhong's research had indulged in highly risky sexual behavior before showing the symptoms. Most of the pathogens were not detected with routine tests but with the more advanced fluorescent PCR tests, Zhong said.

Some sufferers had not received sufficient treatment before the research. With the number of AIDS cases increasing in China, the phobia over the disease has heightened, which has frustrated clinical treatments, Zhong said.

Lin Jun, a patient in the research project, said he had never thought he was infected with HIV but had been wrongly labeled as an HIV-Negative AIDS or AIDS phobia sufferer.

Lin said he was grateful for the research that confirmed he suffers from neisseria gonorrhoeae.

China Daily

(China Daily 05/07/2011 page3)