Three years ago, after a heterosexual sexual encounter, I became seriously ill with what looks like the natural disease progression of AIDS. After an "acute infection" and a "period of asymptomatic health", I have fallen extremely ill to an unrelenting, progressively-worsening AIDS-like demise. I can pinpoint exactly when I was infected with my "chronic viral syndrome of unknown etiology" and because the "acute infection" stage was so distinguishable, I can also pinpoint exactly when my undiagnosed pathogen left my body and infected yet another host.
I had a similar disease onset from an
immunosuppressive virus a virus which also went on to infect many other people in my social circle. I think this virus may be a new enterovirus strain in circulation.
Have quick glance at the symptoms produced by my virus, listed on the top of my web page here:
Chronic Sore Throat Virus
and see if the symptoms profile of this virus I caught matches what you have experienced. One of the strange symptoms that my virus precipitated was a "crepe paper" like fine skin wrinkling across the body, but this is only seen in slightly older people (35+ say).
Do you know the incubation period of the virus you caught (incubation period = the time between your encounter, and the appearance of the very first acute symptom)? My virus has an incubation-period of around 8 to 24 hours (a fact observed several times as other people contracted it).
You might also want consider whether you have caught new
"HIV-like" virus circulating in China:
http://sites.google.com/site/newhivaidslikeviruschina
See also Hanchuchu's PR thread on this new Chinese disease:
http://forums.phoenixrising.me/showthread.php?931-emergency-report-from-China
It is conceivable that my virus is one and the same as the Chinese "HIV-like" virus; however, there are certain differences of symptoms that make me think that the Chinese virus may not be the same as mine.
The Chinese "HIV-like" virus does produce a lowered CD4 count in may people (and sometimes a raised CD8 count as well). In many cases, the CD4 count returns to normal after a few years with the Chinese "HIV-like" virus, and some of the symptoms then improve; but nevertheless, this Chinese disease remains a chronic condition.
Officially the Chinese government have denied that this "HIV-like" disease is real, and claim that its mental symptoms (like super extreme anxiety) and physical symptoms are psychogenic/psychosomatic. Same old story with government inertia. However, most of the Chinese virologists that have looked into this disease are saying that it is real, and that is caused by a microorganism of some sort. But as censorship and pressure to tow the government line is still strong in China, these scientists have to be very careful about what they say officially.
Chinese laboratories has shown that this "HIV-like" virus is NOT a mutated version of HIV, in spite of the name people have given it. The only slightly unusual virus (in my view) that was detected in the blood of these patients by a medical doctor in China named Dr. Zhou Rong was a Coxsackie B3 virus (see the translated Chinese website
here). Many of the symptoms of the Chinese "HIV-like" disease are in fact quite typical of coxsackievirus infection.
Idiopathic CD4 Lymphocytopenia (ICL)
I think you are going down the wrong route with your focus on ICL, and especially with these conspiracy theory ideas that HIV does not cause AIDS.
Idiopathic CD4 Lymphocytopenia is diagnosed when there is a CD4 count of less than 300 cells per mm3 of blood (with an absence of HIV antibodies). Normal CD4 counts of healthy adults are in the range of 500 to 1500 cells per mm3 of blood.
Although ICL has been associated with a retroviral agent called HIAP-II (Human Intracisternal A-Type Particle-Type II), ICL has more than one cause. The elderly sometimes develop ICL, and marathon runners frequently get ICL, and yet are in the pinnacle of health. So this low CD4 count is not of itself a real health problem.
In fact, low CD4 is common in people who have "
viral infections, bacterial infections, parasitic infections, sepsis, tuberculosis, coccidioidomycosis, burns, trauma, intravenous injections of foreign proteins, malnutrition, over-exercising, pregnancy, normal daily variation, psychological stress, and social isolation" (ref:
here).
So there's no big deal about having low CD4.