Drug-resistant HIV strain detected in New York City man

• A previously unknown strain of HIV that is highly resistant to virtually all known drugs and appears to lead to the rapid onset of AIDS was detected in a man last week, New York health officials said Friday.
• While the extent of the spread of the disease is unknown, officials said the situation was alarming.
• "We consider this a major potential problem," said Dr. Thomas Frieden, commissioner of the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.
• The department issued an alert to all hospitals and doctors in the city to be on the lookout for the new strain.
• The virus was found in a New York City man in his mid-40s who engaged in unprotected anal sex with other men on multiple occasions while he was using crystal methamphetamine.
• While HIV strains that are resistant to some drug treatments have been on the rise in recent years throughout the United States, city officials said this case was unique and worrisome for several reasons.
• First, they said, the strain of the disease was resistant to three of the four classes of drugs used to treat HIV from the moment the patient got sick.
• But the resistance comes in combination with its rapid transformation into AIDS.
• At a news conference at New York's health department, where Frieden was joined by nearly a dozen doctors and community leaders, several people recalled having that same worried feeling they had more than two decades ago, when AIDS first started appearing.
• Health officials would not go into detail about how many people the man may have had sex with, but they have several investigators trying to track down partners.
• The man found some of his partners on the Internet, officials said.