Ok, so I don't want this to come across like a 'conspiracy theory' post or something like that but it probably will. Like (I suppose) most people, I had the idea that the AIDS disease starts with someone contracting the HIV virus which then leads to AIDS; however, I stumbled across a website by accident yesterday which documents a different view, that -
There is no proof that the HIV virus is the cause of, or leads to AIDS.
In fact, HIV is a retrovirus ('an incomplete "side" of a DNA spiral ladder'). According to what I read "Viruses are larger and more complete replicable strands. Generally, the ones that can hurt us get into our cells and replicate themselves, and destroy the cells they get into. This has never been observed with a retrovirus, and certainly not with HIV". This is not just a theory proposed by crackpots, but by many actual scientists, including Dr. Peter Duesberg, professor of molecular biology and one of the world’s leading authorities on retroviruses (who has of course been ostracized by those who want to blame it all on HIV).
It's probably too complicated to post the whole argument here, suffice it to say that I have read enough to be convinced that there is a case to be made that there is no connection between HIV and AIDS. Also see the videos HERE. I was shocked watching this video, and then quite angry that this has been allowed to happen.
The point is made in the videos and the article that the drug that is given to people with suspected HIV (the drug is called AZT) is the most toxic drug every allowed to be given to humans and actually CAUSES a lot of the symptoms we associate with AIDS because the drug " "stops all cell division, not only cancerous cell division, and was never approved as a chemotherapy drug because of its side effects, which include myopathy, or muscular atrophy, and severe bone-marrow toxicity."
The upshot is that many people who have been diagnosed with HIV have been given this drug and killed by it, when there was actually nothing wrong with them (see the example in the video of the adopted "HIV infected" little girl who was taking the drug, complained of her "legs burning", and stopped taking the drugs on the advice of Dr Duesberg. She is fine today, unlike the others in her group who continued the drug and all died). As usual, it's all about MONEY.
Anyway, read the article, watch the video and see what you think...
It's probably too complicated to post the whole argument here, suffice it to say that I have read enough to be convinced that there is a case to be made that there is no connection between HIV and AIDS. Also see the videos HERE. I was shocked watching this video, and then quite angry that this has been allowed to happen.
The point is made in the videos and the article that the drug that is given to people with suspected HIV (the drug is called AZT) is the most toxic drug every allowed to be given to humans and actually CAUSES a lot of the symptoms we associate with AIDS because the drug " "stops all cell division, not only cancerous cell division, and was never approved as a chemotherapy drug because of its side effects, which include myopathy, or muscular atrophy, and severe bone-marrow toxicity."
The upshot is that many people who have been diagnosed with HIV have been given this drug and killed by it, when there was actually nothing wrong with them (see the example in the video of the adopted "HIV infected" little girl who was taking the drug, complained of her "legs burning", and stopped taking the drugs on the advice of Dr Duesberg. She is fine today, unlike the others in her group who continued the drug and all died). As usual, it's all about MONEY.
Anyway, read the article, watch the video and see what you think...
Hmmm. I looked at the website just out of curiosity. The only actual scientific evidence offered was a 1997 Virology article questioning the purity of HIV samples. Strangely enough, science has advanced in the intervening 13 years as this article demonstrates (there are many, many others but this one is up to date and you don't need a subscription to read it).
ReplyDeleteMy advice in evaluating such sites is to examine the weight of their scientific evidence rather than their opinions. And, as usual, their science is non-existent.
I don't know MacD
ReplyDeleteIt is a fact that the HIV/AIDs hypothesis is not universally accepted by scientists including at least two Nobel Laureates in Medicine and Physiology.
It is also a fact that the announcement that HIV causes AIDS was made before publication of the relevant research that shows this and that this pronouncement was taken as gospel even though the research that underlay it had not been reviewed and perhaps hasn't to this very day and to question it is to invite hostility even though good science is always founded on skepticism rather than acceptance of political pronouncement .
Unfortunately this is an area of Science that has been thoroughly polluted by politics which is always bad for science and goes a long way to explaining why little progress has been made on the AIDS "epidemic", which I suspect will eventually evaporate when politicians loose interest and something else attracts the big grants.
Andrei:
ReplyDeleteIt is not disputed by any Virologist that HIV is an underlying cause of AIDS. What is disputed is whether it is the sole cause. There appear to be other factors involved in the production of the AIDS syndrome.
What is NOT in dispute, however, is that the use of antiretrovirals has made an enormous difference in the treatment of AIDS and in preventing the development of AIDS in HIV positive individuals. One only has to compare the poor prognosis of individuals who cannot tolerate antiretrovirals to the far better prognosis of those who can to know that any suggestion that such treatment is simply a money-making scam is utter poppycock.
The website you linked to is a good one, but dated. For the most up-to-date information from people who question the HIV-AIS conenction, go to http://rethinkingaids.com.93.seekdotnet.com/ or http://aras.ab.ca/index.php
ReplyDeleteHenry Bauer www.henryhbauer.homestead.com
It is not disputed by any Virologist that HIV is an underlying cause of AIDS.
ReplyDeleteA name from the Post itself - Peter Duesberg who was the Scientist who first described retro virii in the Literature.
I do not claim to know the truth about HIV and AIDS but it is clear that there is something very wrong with the official line peddled about it.
For example in New Zealand there are two groups of HIV+ people. Gay males and non European immigrants (primarily African) and if and when AIDS develops it manifests itself in entirely different ways depending upon the group the sufferer belongs too - so much so that different variants of the HIV virus are postulated.
Its a strange thing no?
Indeed HIV+ status is so rare amongst non Gay people of European extraction that there was a paper published hypothesising that Europeans had relative immunity due to the Plague or something.
Reality in New Zealand there are just over 300 HIV+ people 83% of whom are male and of African women who have acquired this distinction make up the majority of the remainder well over 10% of the total.
Furthermore if these African Women develop AIDS it is most likely to manifest itself as Tuberculosis a disease endemic in Africa but conquered here.
The thing is an HIV- pacific Islander with TB has TB while an HIV+ African with TB has AIDS.
All the while a native born New Zealand woman is far more likely to win lotto than be identified as HIV+
Go figure
Thanks for that site links Henry.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the input Andrei.
Guys MacD is right.
ReplyDeleteThe retrovirals is direct clinical evidence.
There is the confusion here between primary infection (viral) and secondary (perhaps autoimmune) aetiologies.
Be wary about blurring the politics and science on this one.
MrTips, not sure what you mean. I have been looking into it even more and am even more convinced that the link is tenuous. There was also a new film out last year called House Of Numbers that looks at both sides of the argument, and has won 6 awards at film festivals.
ReplyDeleteEven Professor Luc Montagnier who "discovered" HIV in 1983 (and won the 2008 Nobel Prize in Medicine for it) says “We can be exposed to HIV many times without being chronically infected. Our immune system will get rid of the virus within a few weeks.”
This is in direct contrast to the official line that says HIV takes ten years to (somehow?) morph into full blown AIDS. Dr Duesberg makes the point that NO virus takes ten years to make you sick. If you catch a virus (and HIV is actually a retrovirus), you usually get sick in a week or two, a month at the outside. Saying that it takes ten years is just not logical.
I'm not saying I believe it as fact, but I am more inclined to believe that Severe immune deficiencies, commonly referred to as AIDS, "result from the toxicity of many recreational drugs and of most antiretroviral medications, from the abuse of antibiotics and certain therapeutic protocols, from inappropriate life style, and/or from malnutrition, alone or combined."
From the video I saw yesterday, one partial explanation of "AIDS" is Intestinal Dysbiosis, in which the flora in the stomach are destroyed by some of the activities around gay men - anal douching, too many antibiotics, and drying out caused by lubricants. See videos HERE
eg, in studies done, it was found that 100% of HIV+ subjects had candida in their fecal samples, compared to 40% of the general population. The levels of this were 10,000 times higher in HIV+ subjects than in their negative counterparts.
According to what I have read, the flora in your stomach (sometimes referred to as "the forgotten organ") are vitally important when it comes to the immune system.
The one thing I am sure of - if you get HIV, don't drink the Kool-Aid the medical establishment offers.
Fletcher,
ReplyDeleteIf you choose which facts to include it's usually pretty easy to make a case for anything. Take the Jesus Myth people, imagine if you didn't have a position on the historicity of Jesus and you came across a site like this one which takes bits and pieces form history and theology to build a case that Jesus of Nazareth never existed. Read in isolation they seem to make a pretty good case, but when you read more widely it become obvious they are nuts.
It shouldn't be a surprise that people can do the same thing with HIV denialism, evolutionary biology , the settlement of New Zealand or whatever.
To really assess something controversial like this you need to read the orthodox side as well, and because our brains come pre-packed with so many cognitive biases its not funny we really should be extra suspicious of theories that fit our political positions.
In the case of HIV-AIDS the evidence is just overwhelming. There is a nice summary here which might put the deniers claims in context.
David,
ReplyDeleteI don't buy it.
I am still not convinced that HIV is harmful. To cite a couple of real-world examples -
1) The first is Lindsey Nagel. She was from Romania and adopted by an American couple. When she left Romania she tested negative for HIV, then when she arrived in the US and had another test it came out positive (why?).
Not knowing any better at first, the Nagels followed their pediatrician’s instructions to administer anti-retroviral drugs, which at the time meant high dosage AZT. For months the Nagels watched as their initially healthy daughter deteriorated, getting sicker and sicker. Among other things, her growth became stunted. Of course all symptoms were ascribed to her supposed HIV infection, and not the drugs.
After nearly two years of this, the Nagels were alerted to Peter Duesberg’s dissenting view by a relative who read an article about him in National Review. The Nagels became intrigued and wrote to Duesberg. He responded immediately, telling them to take Lindsey off the antiretroviral drugs, or they would kill her. They did, and for that reason Lindsey is alive today.
As for the other children back then that her doctor treated, the doctor herself says "There was nothing you could do years ago. Most children back then did not live past seven to 12 years old. And it was hard; these were children that you got attached to. It was really hard. All we could do was provide some supportive care and treat their opportunistic infections. We had many deaths, 10 to 12 in 1994."
2) As reported on CNN, the Gambian President Yahya Jammeh said he had a dream about a "cure" for AIDS made out of herbs. He started gtetting it administered to people and they started getting better. Because of the herbs? Doubtful. Because they have been taken off the antiretroviral drugs that are making them seick in the first place? More likely -
"At the hospital in the capital, patients claim the president's concoction is making a difference to them.
Ousman Sow, 54, said he's been HIV-positive since 1996 and had been taking anti-retrovirals for the past fours years until he volunteered for this program.
Four weeks later, he said he's gained 30 pounds and feels like a new person.
"I am cured at this moment," he said.
Asked if he had any HIV symptoms, he responded, "No, I don't. As I stand before you I can honestly tell you I have ceased to have any HIV symptoms."
Patient after patient gave similar statements to CNN."
LINK: http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/africa/03/15/koinange.africa/index.html
3) Maria Papagiannidou-St Pierre. A senior Greek journalist and ex-AIDS patient, Papagiannidou-St Pierre was born in 1965. She was diagnosed "HIV positive" in 1985. From 1995 to 2005 she was a full-blown AIDS patient suffering horrifically from the side-effects of the medications, being sometimes told she had no more than a week to live. In 2006 she started the website www.hivwave.gr and married the Canadian "HIV negative" Gilles St Pierre. On April 23, 2007, she stopped taking the pills prescribed against AIDS, became strong again and regained the freedom we all lost in 1984. So, what had she suffered from — a deadly hoax? She has written a book now called "Goodbye AIDS - Did it ever exist?"
There are many, many cases like this.
There is a new movie out now called House Of Numbers which examines the topic from both sides and has won six awards at film festivals. I doubt it will ever be shown here (pity). See here for an interview with 2 people coming out of the movie - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGSlSG3pA5o&feature=player_embedded
ReplyDeleteThe woman tells how she'd been diagnosed with "full blown AIDS" and told to get her affairs in order 12 years ago, had the associated health problems with the drugs, but after 9 years found out that HIV might not be the cause, and stopped taking the drugs - she is fine now. The guy in the video has been taking the drugs for 23 years and still is (he is afraid to stop taking them).
Sorry, those links didn't come out too well.
ReplyDeleteCNN Africa story: LINK
Youtube Video: LINK
House of Numbers movie: LINK
Fletcher,
ReplyDeleteThe plural of anecdote isn't data. By seeking out HIV denialists you are ignoring a huge body of evidence that makes them look crazy.
David, there is also a huge group of skilled scientists who do not agree. In fact, when Dr Gallo from the US claimed it was his retrovirus that caused AIDS, it wasn't peer-reviewed (in fact, he didn't publish his theory in a scientific journal until after these claims had been made), and when he did it turned out that only 44 out of 90 patients he used had the retorvirus.
ReplyDeleteDr Duesberg (who does not think HIV causes AIDS) was the first to map the structure of retroviruses back in 1970. He also was the one to discover cancer causing genes.
On the other side, Gallo had tried to blame retroviruses on cancer, leukemia and Alzheimers, among other things, none of which turned out to be right. It's like he was looking for a contender.
The test for HIV itself is different in different countries. You can take a test in one country and be HIV+ and in another country and be HIV-. The whole thing is highly doubtful.
The thing is, these people cannot now say that HIV is not the cause, because to do so would mean they would have to admit that they themselves caused the deaths of thousands of people by giving them these toxic drugs to treat a harmless retorvirus.