Posted on 06/03/2006 10:13:16 PM PDT by neverdem
H.I.V. causes AIDS. This is not a controversial claim but an established fact, based on more than 20 years of solid science. It is as certain as the descent of humans from apes and the falling of dropped objects to the ground.
So why reiterate the obvious? Because lately, a bizarre theory has gained ground — one that claims that H.I.V. is harmless, and that the antiretroviral drugs that curb the growth of the virus cause rather than treat AIDS. Such talk sounds to most of us like quackery, but the theory has emerged as a genuine menace to public health in the United States and, particularly, in South Africa.
The theory, which we call AIDS denialism, has gained such currency with President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa that his administration is reluctant to expand access to antiretroviral drugs. Despite generous allocations from the country's Treasury and substantial assistance from foreign donors, only a quarter of those needing antiretrovirals receive them. This response is poor by the standards of middle-income countries, but it is especially troublesome in South Africa, which has more H.I.V.-positive people than any other country.
American AIDS denialists are partly to blame for South Africa's backsliding AIDS policy. Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, the health minister, has described antiretrovirals as poisons. She is supported in these views by Roberto Giraldo, a New York hospital technologist who says AIDS is caused by deficiencies in the diet, and who served on President Mbeki's AIDS advisory panel in 2000. The minister promotes nutritional alternatives like lemons, garlic and olive oil to treat H.I.V. infection. Several prominent South Africans have died of AIDS after opting to change their diets instead of taking antiretrovirals.
Another American AIDS denialist, David Rasnick, a regular letter-writer to South African newspapers, absurdly claims that H.I.V. cannot be transmitted between...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
This one gets filed along with "A biopsy causes cancer to spread" or "If you swallow the chewing gum a rubber tree will grow in your stomach".
I notice you don't bother to address my points, only my single use of hyperbole.
See post #30 - that's fine.
Yeah, the CD4+ T cells are the "helper" T cells.
Yeap you got it.
Deusberg's offer - or mine if I had ever made such - can't really be taken up because of issues of medical ethics. But nevertheless, I am quite sure Duesberg would be as unconcerned about an HIV infection today as he ever was.
But you must note that Duesberg remains open minded about the ultimate cause of AIDS. He is only very sure that it is not HIV. His fairly high degree of certainty on that point is based on his vast knowledge of retroviruses which at one time was unchallenged and widely heralded, before he refused to "go along" with the HIV-AIDS hypothesis.
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