HIV’s Greatest Foe Went Down With MH17

[alsame]

HIV’s Greatest Foe Went Down With MH17
Dr. Joep M. Lange, a Dutch researcher whose work toward finding prevention and treatment for the disease is unmatched, and partner Jacqueline von Tongeren were killed in the crash.


Dr. Joep M. Lange, who died in the crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, was one of a handful of brand-name AIDS experts. Of course eulogistic hyperbole is expected after this sort of tragedy, but Lange truly was every inch the visionary, charismatic, and good guy the hurried obituaries suggest.

<snip>

Lange started his career examining how best to measure, and therefore predict, disease progression and response to treatment. He and a handful of others developed the HIV “antigen” test, a first-generation attempt at measuring the amount of virus in the bloodstream. Within a decade, his approach led to the routine measurement of the HIV “viral load,” a test performed as routinely as a cholesterol HDL both to diagnose infection and monitor treatment response.

But as he worked on the epidemic locally in Amsterdam and Western Europe, Lange also was thinking globally. Through international meetings, he learned what HIV threatened to do worldwide; therefore, in the early 1990s, he took over oversight of clinical research in the WHO Global AIDS Program. As he wrote in 1993, referring to the newly recognized scale of the epidemic in Africa, “It is clear that countries most struck by the HIV epidemic are unable to cope with the enormous burden of care required.”

<snip>

Joep Lange’s death leaves a large void in the world of AIDS treatment. Others, though, trained on Lange-ian principles, will rill rise and fill the gap. What will not be restored so easily, soon or perhaps ever, is the remarkable gift he gave to doctors and patients across the world: an unflagging optimism in the face of a raging epidemic, and a belief that humans can and must work together for the public good.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/07/18/the-aids-battle-lost-a-hero-on-malaysia-airlines-flight-17.html

[Hekate]

1. 100 brave disease-fighters went down on that ship. Thank you alsame.

I especially thank you for your OP because some twisted soul on this board asked why a hundred HIV/AIDS fighters were so important they deserved a special mention.

I have no answer to that except this: each family feels its loss and pain uniquely, but Joep Lange's life and death will affect millions he never met.

[alsame]

2. I saw that, don't even know

what to say to someone who can't see the impact of the loss of these HIV/AIDS fighters.

And you're welcome.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

8. unbelievable, at DU

[madinmaryland]

15. I really never thought I would say this, but I feel there may be some

going on here.

100 people trying to solve a horrible disease and 195 people just on an airplane going someone.

[Mnemosyne]

3. ...

[navarth]

4. the tragedy grows in proportion

very sad to hear this.

[Avalux]

5. I met him once, he developed the viral load test.

Being able to actually measure the amount of HIV particles in the bloodstream changed everything.

With Dr. Lange, there were other HIV researchers and activists on the plane, en route to a conference in Australia.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

7. omg.

just omg.

[flamingdem]

14. Wow, you are lucky to have met

him and we're lucky to learn about all he contributed.

[Roy Serohz]

6. DUly RECommended

But, this time, with sadness

[Demeter]

9. Blowback

I hope the PNACers get a special kind of hell for their efforts to subvert Ukraine and start a shooting war in Central Europe.

[Cha]

11. "A special kind of Hell" for Putin and the assholes he gave the missile to.

[Kurska]

12. I'm sick of seeing people carrying water for a gay bashing and murderous regime.

It isn't liberal and frankly if you're going to do it it is my opinion you don't belong here.

And most importantly a memorial thread for a great man isn't the place to do it.

No mention of the murderous gay bashing monsters that gave the missiles to the Russian rednecks that shot down the plane in the first place. Distract distract and distract away from the monster that tortures gays and attempts to subjugate their neighbors by the sword.

Blowback my behind.

[SidDithers]

17. +1...

Well said.

Sid

[Cha]

10. So unbearably sad, alsame.. mahalo.

[Ohio Joe]

13. RIP

[smirkymonkey]

18. Very tragic.