The headline is nonsensical — the disease has no relation, or similarity to, AIDS, in symptomology, or means of transmission...
You are absolutely correct. This is attempt# 5 zillion and 2 to normalize/destigmatize AIDS, as just one more bad thing that can “happen” to you.
One gets Chaga’s primarily by being poor and from S America, wherever the bug is that carries the disease.
To paraphrase an infectious disease prof from years ago, it is possible to get AIDS sitting on a toilet seat, but it is more comfortable to do so in bed. The point being that behavior under one’s conscious control is the biggest risk factor.
Correct this disease is not like AIDS - for one it is not sexually transmitted. But - if the disease causing organism or the vector acclimatizes ...on its steady march north - this could eventually bring the disease to the U.S.A. What the stream of illegal aliens bring to the party is a growing pool of infected blood - a reservoir for blood sucking insects to feed on. And it would be possible for a new vector to develop such as the bed bug (also increasing due to the march north of illegal aliens). Chagas disease is caused by the parasite Trypanosoma cruzi (an amoeba I think), which is transmitted to animals and people by insect vectors that are found only in the Americas (mainly, in rural areas of Latin America where poverty is widespread). The insect vectors are called triatomine bugs (also called kissing bugs or cone nose bugs). Chagas disease is also referred to as American trypanosomiasis.
Who knows?
Aids was smuggled into the USA in the rear end of a Hudson.
This new threat may be brought in by fudge packing beetles!
Chagas Disease: “The New HIV/AIDS of the Americas”
There are additional parallels. Chagas disease has emerged as an important blood transfusion–related risk throughout the Americas just as HIV/AIDS did in the early 1980s, prior to the implementation of widespread blood screening and testing [18]–[20]. Moreover, mother-to-child transmission leading to congenital Chagas disease and other adverse neonatal outcomes is increasingly recognized [21]–[24] (Table 2). Both congenital Chagas disease and HIV/AIDS have a recognized clinical syndrome [21], [25], with adverse birth outcomes as well as deleterious maternal effects in pregnancy [22], [23], [26]. During pregnancy, the rate of vertical transmission of T. cruzi infection is approximately 5% (although some investigators believe the rate could be as high as 10%), whereas it is 15%–40% for untreated HIV/AIDS [27] and 1%–2% for mothers who receive antiretroviral therapy [28]. The Pan American Health Organization estimates that there are over 14,000 cases of congenital Chagas disease in Latin America [29], with 2,000 newborns infected annually in North America alone [24], compared to 36,000 pediatric HIV/AIDS cases in Latin America [15].FReepmail me if you want on or off my combined microbiology/immunology ping list.
The Daily Mail website crashed on me twice, so I gave up on it, but the titles look awfully similar.