Chimpanzee Reservoirs of Pandemic and Nonpandemic HIV-1 Title and link to Science abstract
Posted on 05/25/2006 9:40:17 PM PDT by neverdem
By studying chimpanzee droppings in remote African jungles, scientists reported yesterday, they have found direct evidence of a missing link between a chimpanzee virus and the one that causes human AIDS.
Scientists have long suspected that chimpanzees are the source of the human AIDS pandemic because at least one subspecies carries a simian immune deficiency virus closely related to H.I.V., the virus that causes AIDS.
But because the simian virus, known as S.I.V.cpz, was identified in chimpanzees in captivity, researchers could not be sure that the same simian virus existed among these apes in the wild.
It does, the team of American, European and Cameroonian scientists reported in the journal Science. They found it by testing hundreds of chimpanzee droppings collected in Cameroon.
The genetic and immunologic tests were developed in stages over the past seven years to help trace the evolution of H.I.V. and solve the mysterious origins of AIDS, said Dr. Beatrice H. Hahn, a virologist at the University of Alabama in Birmingham. Dr. Hahn led the international team that conducted the study, which combined genetics and epidemiology.
The new findings, she said in a telephone interview, do not explain the entire chain of events that led from the first human H.I.V. infection to the infection of 65 million people around the world.
But, Dr. Hahn reported, her team's findings show "for the first time a clear picture of the origin of H.I.V.-1 and the seeds of the AIDS pandemic." H.I.V.-1 is the virus that causes the vast majority of AIDS cases in the world. The first cases of AIDS were detected in the United States in 1981.
Studies estimate that the human AIDS virus jumped species 50 to 75 years ago. But no one knows who the first infected person was or how that person acquired H.I.V...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
quit monkeying around...
Maybe they don't have goats in that part of the world.
Folks in that part of the world eat those critters. It's called bushmeat.
ping
rotten sometimes but they eat it...
Ingestion. ....I guess I feel better now.
More likely knicking oneself cutting one up to eat.
Reading the first article on the subject this afternoon, even before it got on FR I knew people would be strangely obsessed with the weird idea that people got it from having sex with chimpanzees instead of the obvious cause which is the widespread practice of butchering and eating them.
Pretty close geographically to the areas that break out with Ebola and Lassa occasionally.
Probably not the way everyone is thinking. A chimpanzee can easily tear a man's arms off. Screwing them would probably prove difficult.
What's so weird about assuming that it was spread by people making whoopee with monkeys? That sounds almost normal compared to some sexual appetites in the proccess of being main streamed these days.
Here's more:
From this source.
In his book, The River, the journalist Edward Hooper suggested that HIV could be traced to the testing of an oral polio vaccine called Chat, given to about a million people in the Belgian Congo , Ruanda and Urundi in the late 1950s. To be reproduced, live polio vaccine needs to be cultivated in living tissue, and Hooper's belief is that Chat was grown in kidney cells taken from local chimps infected with SIVcmz. This, he claims, would have resulted in the contamination of the vaccine with chimp SIV, and a large number of people subsequently becoming infected with HIV-1.
There's more about it on that site. Scientists discredited his work, but he could've been on to something.
Thanks for the info. Do you have any reliable links on that?
Hows Jane Goodall?
I would bet that 'monkey' would resist such, if capable (I know, don't go there.): 'monkeys' have better taste...
...and may 'taste better': fwiw, my bet is on the bushmeat/butchering connection, which has been postulated as a vector for Marburg and Ebola as well.
Cameroon!
If this sentence isn't a clue that this whole HIV-AIDS thing is a crock, then I don't know what would serve.
If this sentence isn't a clue that this whole HIV-AIDS thing is a crock, then I don't know what would serve.
Huh? It's true. HIV-1 causes the vast majority of AIDS cases. Far fewer are caused by HIV-2, mainly in West Africa. Somehow, I doubt you're a medical doctor, let alone an epidemiologist.
Nuisance Creatures Threaten Lobsters in Long Island Sound
Large Study Finds No Link between Marijuana and Lung Cancer
FReepmail me if you want on or off my health and science ping list.
**marking for reference....wondering what else is in vaccines we have no idea about
Call me a dissenter, but I still haven't seen any evidence that HIV causes AIDS other than the usual circular reasoning.
"quit monkeying around"
LOL--how p.c.!
What this study does not say, at least in the abstract, is whether any of these HIV positive infants were given anti-viral drugs.
If they were given anti-virals, then the study is worthless.
Didn't Clinton get kicked out of a zoo for that once?!
Assuming they didn't like it.
< ]B^)
Agree with Drew here. The most likely means of transferrance is through contact with blood from chimpanzees killed for bushmeat.
Good for you Mr Valentine. People just don't want to hear about this, but you are sticking to your guns.
The HIV Hypothesis - that there exists a virus, HIV, that causes the disease/diseases we call AIDs - must, if it is a true hypothesis - correctly predict certain observable facts.
One of these predictions is that "viral" AIDs should spread like a virus. Let's examine this prediction.
When looking at what causes a disease there are a number of "usual suspects". Pathogens (bacteria or viruses) are a likely cause. Toxin exposure is also a likely cause. Deficiency (not enough vitamins, not enough food) is a third.
To tell which one we are dealing with (pathogen or toxin/deficiency) we look at the epidemiology of the disease (epidemiology - how a disease spreads).
AIDs has stayed within the defined at-risk sectors of the population (e.g. drug users, homosexual men) and hasn't expanded exponentially into the general population. Despite Oprah's dire warnings (remember those?), heterosexual non-drug users (at any rate, those who eat properly and who have no significant toxin exposure) have not in fact been ravaged by AIDs. Prostitutes who don't do drugs and have no other catabolic stresses haven't been ravaged by AIDs.
But viruses just do not behave like this. They are little bits of nucleic clockwork. They are obligatory parasites - they infect, and they have to infect. They expand exponentially into populations and then die off as the population achieves resistance. The epidemiology of AIDs is non-infectious, and so AIDs must be non-viral.
The epidemiology of AIDs is instead similar to that of toxin exposure or nutrition-deprivation. A good analogy is with long-term smokers or heavy drinkers: people with heavy exposure to toxins for a long period tend to develop diseases: those who aren't exposed, don't. You don't catch lung cancer or cirrhosis of the liver by touch, you get them from toxin exposure.
In the early cases of AIDs (GRID = Gay Related Immune Disease/Disorder) there was an obvious toxic cause: the inhaling of amyl nitrite to assist anal intercourse. Inhaling of amyl nitrite is a lethal habit, and a demarcated homosexual phenomenum. Therefore this form of AIDs appeared amongst gay men only, and stayed in the gay population.
But the vast majority of AIDs deaths were not and are not caused by nitrite poppers. Hardly. Poppers merely began the AIDs furore. Nowadays the classic popper-induced disease (Kaposi's Sarcoma, a dangerous cancerous lesion in the lungs) is no even longer defined as an AIDs disease - as the gay community drastically cut back on popper consumption in the early AIDs era.
The real killer in AIDs (the real toxic cause) was and is iatrogenic poisoning: by which I mean the treatment for HIV infection itself causes the disease. AZT - the old wonder drug for AIDS - is an extremely toxic chemotherapy drug: 1000 mg of AZT a day for months or years would kill anyone. 90% of all those thousands of AIDs deaths in the AZT days were caused by toxic liver failure, NOT by one of the CDC’s AIDs-defining diseases. Go figure.
These days doctors don't use AZT, or use less of it. They use cathepsin inhibitors. These aren't as poisonous as AZT, though they're still poisonous. Hence less patients are dropping dead, and so the HAART cocktail treatments have been hailed as miracle cures.
But my point would be - a cure for what? The only reason someone is given these sublethal AIDs “cures” is that they have reacted positively on a HIV test. They are assumed to be infected, even if they are symptomless, and therefore they come under a lot of pressure, both legal & moral, to comply with treatment. The treatment is poisonous (in the case of pure AZT extremely so) and so the patient tends to get worse. Result - you have an epidemic-by-diagnosis. You get diagnosed with the virus, and some time later you get sick.
But surely if an HIV test says you're infected, you're infected?
Well, no. The HIV tests (ELISA, Western Blot) have not been calibrated against the isolated virus itself. This is known as "gold standard calibration" - without such calibration, a serological test for viral antibodies has no business being used in medical practice. Without calibration you don’t know if your test is giving you a false-positive result or not.
There are over fifty conditions that have been documented to cause false positives in HIV tests. Some are probably statistically irrelevant (e.g. leprosy). But most are highly relevant. Tuberculosis, flu vaccination, recent tetanus vaccination, herpes, renal failure, pregnancy (second or later pregnancies particularly), rheumatoid arthritis, "sticky" blood (in Africans), "sickle cell" (in Africans), being African, organ transplants, malaria, hepatitis, haemophilia and antibodies to sperm have all known to create false-positives in HIV tests. Without calibration we don't know that anybody who's ever shown up positive on an HIV test actually had the virus - it could have been a false positive.
I repeat: without calibrating an HIV test against the virus itself it is impossible to use that test to indicate presence of the virus. The HIV tests react to proteins in the blood. To prove that they’re interacting with HIV proteins, you must have an isolate of HIV and be able to determine what the HIV proteins are.
So why not calibrate the tests already? Answer: you need an isolate of the virus to do this, and ... the HIV virus has not yet been isolated. There is a Nobel prize waiting for the first person who can isolate HIV. No-one has done it. After twenty years we are entitled to ask if the virus is actually there to be isolated.
Without an isolate of the HIV virus there's no proof that HIV actually exists. There’s no proof of sexual transmission, no proof of pathology. The epidemiology is non-viral.
So - why are we sticking with the HIV hypothesis? Does it have any predictive value? Has use of the HIV theory allowed us to cure anybody, as opposed to the thousands of people doctors have - inadvetently - killed with AZT?
Oh great. Just great. More fallout from US Military experiments.
I always found it questionable, too, especially after reading about a small group of scientists who discredit it.
I think that theory is probably accurate, considering that sanitation is likely near zero and hand washing is probably zero.
LOL! Your tag line: Was the days of no, during the reign of Queen Victoria?
He did have a monkey under his desk in the Oval office more than once.
Thanks for the info & link.
If they were given anti-virals, then the study is worthless.
You can go back to the link in comment# 24. The links in the abstract function, if not always as expected. IIRC, the anti-viral drugs were continued as long as the kids continued having significant p24 antigen titers, which was used as a surrogate for eventually positive HIV cultures.
Here's another article for which I have to thank you for causing me to search for it. Click on "Related Articles" at PubMed for more.
Basics of the virology of HIV-1 and its replication.
Human immunodeficiency virus is undoubtedly the causative agent of AIDS. The understanding of HIV-1 pathogenesis is essential to develop and maintain antiretroviral treatment and vaccination. Since the first isolation of HIV-1 in cell culture, thousands of publications dealing with HIV and/or AIDS per year were released. In this review we give a basic overview of the virology of HIV-1 including the functions of the different HIV-1 proteins required for effective viral replication. Moreover, we summarize the interactive processes between HIV-1 and its target cells. Finally, the HIV-1 specific immune response and the current status of antiretroviral therapy are briefly described in this review.
You might be interested in the link I found, "Basics of the virology of HIV-1 and its replication." It's in comment# 44.
This is typical of mainstream HIV articles. An bare assertion buttressed only by an intensifying adjective, and followed by an appeal to conformity.
You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink. Alternatively, there are none so blind as those who refuse to see.
The following link includes the entire article including references. Once again, thanks for the impetus to find it.
Cumulative data on serological testing of newborns and infants have shown that (i) maternal and newborn anti-HIV-1 IgG titers are high at delivery, which may explain the persistence of antibody in the infants of seropositive mothers; (ii) in some situations, serial HIV-1 antibody testing may identify infected infants; and (iii) detection of anti-HIV-1 IgA or IgM is specific for infection but the sensitivity of this assay may be compromised in certain situations, such as when infected infants are hypogammaglobulinemic or when the rise and fall of HIV-1-specific IgM synthesis following acute infection has been completed before delivery of the infant. Cumulative data on PCR, viral culture, and tests for antigen in newborns and infants have shown that (i) among all age groups, viral culture is probably the most specific test available for detection of HIV-1, as PCR and the p24 antigen test may (though rarely) give false-positive results; (ii) the sensitivity of these tests increases in the order of antigen, culture, and PCR, with relatively insensitive results in the first 3 months of life for all of these tests; (iii) the sensitivity of all of these tests improves and approximates 90 to 100% when infants over 6 months of age are tested; and (iv) data regarding the sensitivity, specificity, and usefulness of these virological assays in infants under 3 months of age are very scant and inconclusive.
Look, surely HIV exists and is transmitted en utero. That's not at issue.
What is at issue is the consequence of this. If left alone there would be no consequence whatsoever of an HIV infection; epidemiological data suggests this virus has been infecting humans for centuries, millennia or longer. But when Doctors decide to poison innocent children with lethal anti-virals in the name of "curing" a harmless passenger virus, they are inadvertently causing with their treatment the very disease they claim to be curing.
It's happened before, and its happening with AIDS.
Some people are bound to notice and object, that's natural, and its also entirely natural that Doctors are not too eager to face the horror they have created, and will insist that they are acting rationally. This means that by and large they will continue to insist that HIV causes AIDS even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
Otherwise they would have to admit horriffic responsibility.
Worst Job alert.
I'm not saying antiretroviral drugs don't have any adverse drug reactions. I always have a first suspicion about adverse drug reactions. I don't buy Duesberg's argument of misdiagnosis, and I don't buy that it's a big Pharma cabal.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.