Launch of a flash funding appeal for Marburg Outbreak

By WHO, "We are here today, launching this appeal, because the Marburg outbreak has become a national crisis.

It is important that this is seen as a crisis not just by the ministry of health. We've passed that stage. We still don't have the total picture of the outbreak. The situation is still worrying. There is evidence that more provinces are involved. It certainly hasn't peaked yet.

Each ministry must understand that this is a national crisis and it needs their serious attention. This is not just a threat to human life but to economic life. Because this is a dangerous disease other countries are watching Angola closely. So it has the potential of travel and trade impacts.

Please everyone note the difference between Marburg and another killer virus (clue: it's one that hit the headlines in the 1980s).

Marburg is an example of a "real" virus. It can be isolated, and it's epidemiology (how it spreads) is that of a virus - it spreads geometrically though a population until immunity or host-scarcity stops it.

The other virus of which I speak is a "fake" or "made-up" virus.

It has a non-viral epidemiology. It stays within at-risk populations and stays chronic within those populations for years. This is the epidemiology of toxin exposure, or of a deficiency disease.

Also, deaths caused by this other virus are strongly confined to those persons in receipt of medication against it - an indicator that iatrogenic posioning rather than a virus is the cause.

Another difference between "real" and "fake" viruses is that fake viruses require enormous media campaigns and mountains of dubious statistics to support them in the public consciousness. Real viruses need no help at all.

Are you actually suggesting HIV is not a virus? Because if so, you would be wrong. You can see HIV under a microscope. You can measure it. You can detect it. It's a real, tangible viral strain.

AIDS is not a virus. It is a syndrom. It is the human body's reaction to having the HIV virus. You can have HIV in your body for some time before manifesting full-blown AIDS. AIDS is real too. It is a complication of having HIV.

There is nothing fictitious about either AIDS or HIV, so what are you getting at? Are you suggesting that because there are activists (*gasp* - gay activists) attempting to spread the word about the threat HIV and AIDS represent that you can be dismisive of the threat HIV represents?

I knew a hemophiliac who got HIV from a blood transfusion in the 80's. He was only 14 when he died. His mother couldn't bear to tell people how her son died because of the social stigma attached to having AIDS. She didn't want people to think her son had been gay. He was a little kid who kept his terminal illness secret because of people who say things like you wrote. I wish you could've looked him in the eyes and told him he was dying of a political agenda.

Don't become one of Fred Phelps' hate zombies and think it's OK to ignore a real disease because it mainly infects people you don't like. Because you would be wrong.

Thank you for your reply Shadowman.

You can't see HIV under a microscope. Well you can't see any virus under a microscope, but I mean - you cannot detect HIV in any way. To date it has not been isolated.

To isolate a retrovirus you need to:

A) Create an isolate. i.e. create a culture from putatively infected material and take a micrograph from the 1.16 density band which shows ONLY particles with the correct characteristics of an exogenous retrovirus. Your band then contains an isolate of the putative retrovirus.

B) Prove that what you have is viral. This means that it not only looks like a virus, but is also infectious. You must be able to take your isolate, infect something with it, grow more virus, and be able to get another picture/proof of isolate.

This process has not been carried out sucessfully. The AIDs industry has not managed to isolate the HIV virus, and its been over twenty years now. You have to wonder what the hold-up is.

I am indeed saying that HIV has not been isolated and proven to exist

Please don't fall into the trap of attributing strange motives to me. I am sorry to say that if he died when your post suggests he died, your HIV-positive friend almost certainly (90% chance) died from liver failure. He was killed with multiple 1000 mg doses of the lethally poisonous chemotherapy drug AZT. This is what I mean by a disease with an iatrogenic cause (iatrogenic = caused by doctors). No virus need apply.

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