Minerva

The age at which people become infected with HIV has been falling in the United States from over 30 in the early 1980s to around 25 in the early 1990s (New England Journal of Medicine 1994;330:789). Monitoring of national data has also shown that the median treatment free incubation period between seroconversion and symptoms of AIDS is 12 years for 20 year olds, 10 years for 30 year olds, and 8 years for 40 year olds.

As Britain presses on with its plans for a national lottery perhaps ministers might read an account in the “American Journal of Public Health” (1994;84:237-41) of the links between legalised and pathological gambling. In states where legal gambling has been available for less than 10 years the prevalence of pathological gambling in the adult population is 0.5%; but in those where gambling has been legal for more than 20 years the figure is 1.5%. These data are not surprising but they should not be ignored.

Dogs may be infected with three different hookworms, two of which are limited to the tropics. The third, Ancylostoma caninum, is found both in the tropics and in temperate zones and is now becoming recognised as a …