After four decades, there is still no cure.

As the world commemorates World AIDS Day on Wednesday, we look back at the struggle against AIDS since its debut 40 years ago, with the hopes of eradicating the terrible disease profoundly affected by the coronavirus epidemic.

- 1981: The first warning -

In June 1981, epidemiologists in the United States report five instances of an uncommon kind of pneumonia in homosexual men in California, with some of them dying. Others have discovered unusual forms of skin cancer.

It is the earliest warning concerning the still-unnamed and unknown Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS).

Late in the year, doctors find "opportunistic infections" among injectable drug users, as well as hemophiliacs and Haitian residents in the United States (mid-1982).

In 1982, the term AIDS is coined for the first time.

- 1983: HIV Detection -

Francoise Barre-Sinoussi and Jean-Claude Chermann, working under Luc Montagnier, find the virus that "may be" responsible for AIDS in January 1983. LAV is the name given to it.

Robert Gallo, a US expert, is reported to have discovered the "likely" cause of AIDS, the retrovirus HTLV-III, the following year.

The two viruses are discovered to be identical, and the human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV, is formally named in May 1986.

In 2008, Barre-Sinoussi and Montagnier were awarded the Nobel Prize for their finding.

Antiretroviral therapy was first used in 1987.

The first anti-retroviral medication, known as AZT, is approved in the United States in March 1987. It is costly and has several adverse effects.

To increase awareness, the World Health Organization (WHO) proclaims December 1, 1988 as the inaugural World AIDS Day. The number of AIDS cases globally is predicted to reach above 150,000 by June of the following year.

- Falling stars in the early 1990s -

In October 1985, American actor Rock Hudson became the first high-profile AIDS fatality. Other celebrities who succumb to the condition include Freddie Mercury, the lead singer of Queen, and Rudolf Nureyev, the famed Russian dancer and choreographer (January 1993).

AIDS becomes the top cause of death among Americans aged 25 to 44 in 1994.

- New approach in 1995-96 -

A new class of medications heralds the beginning of anti-retroviral therapy combinations.

Tri-therapies are the first successful HIV treatments, albeit they are not a cure and are still expensive.

The number of AIDS fatalities in the United States begins to fall in 1996.

- 50 million illnesses in 1999 -

According to a study issued by WHO and the Joint United Nations Programme on AIDS (UNAIDS) in November 1999, 50 million individuals have been infected with HIV since it first surfaced, with 16 million of them dying.

With 12.2 million cases, Africa is the worst-affected continent.

- 2001: generic pharmaceuticals -

A pact is reached on November 13, 2001 at the World Trade Organization to allow developing nations to create generic medications, after an agreement made in 2000 by UNAIDS and five large pharma corporations to deliver inexpensive therapies in poorer countries.

- HIV'shield' in 2012 -

US authorities authorized the first-ever daily medication to help prevent HIV infection in July 2012. Truvada is a pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, medication used to prevent HIV infection in high-risk HIV-negative persons.

- Treatment spreads in 2017 -

UNAIDS announces that for the first time ever, more than half of the world's HIV-positive people are receiving antiretroviral therapy.

According to UNAIDS, the percentage is now three-quarters: 27.5 million individuals are being treated out of 37.7 million who are infected.

- Covid's Impact in 2020/2021 -

UNAIDS' objective of eliminating AIDS as a public health issue by 2030 is jeopardized by the Covid-19 epidemic.

Access to health services, testing, and treatment has been interrupted by the new illness, impeding progress in the battle against AIDS, which has killed 36.3 million people in 40 years.