Posted on 08/02/2008 12:22:48 PM PDT by neverdem
Updated federal estimates of the annual number of new HIV infections in the United States, released today, reveal that while the AIDS epidemic here is worse than previously thought, prevention efforts appear to be having some effect.
Even though the number of Americans living with HIV has risen by more than a quarter million people since 1998 -- largely the result of life-extending antiretroviral drugs -- the number of new cases each year has declined slightly over that period. That suggests that a person's likelihood of transmitting the virus to someone else is substantially lower now than it was a decade ago.
The new, if indirect, evidence that prevention programs are paying off was one of the few encouraging findings in an update on the American AIDS epidemic released today by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on the eve of the 17th International AIDS Conference, in Mexico City.
"Over 95 percent of people living with HIV are not transmitting to someone else in a given year," said David R. Holtgrave, an expert on AIDS prevention at the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University. "What that says is the transmission rate has been kept very low by prevention efforts."
Those include targeting public health messages to high-risk groups, promoting widespread AIDS testing, and getting quick medical care for newly diagnosed cases, which in most cases lowers the person's infectiousness.
The CDC spends about...
--snip--
The epidemic in the black community is distinctly different from the national epidemic.
From 2001 to 2005, 38 percent of the new diagnoses in African Americans were in women, and 46 percent of new infections overall were from heterosexual contact. Among whites during the same period, 16 percent of new infections were in women, and 16 percent were from heterosexual transmission...
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Chimp Virus Is Linked to H.I.V.
Chimpanzee Reservoirs of Pandemic and Nonpandemic HIV-1
Basics of the virology of HIV-1 and its replication.
FWIW
“www.avert.org/evidence” might be a site of interest to you as it discusses both the arguments against HIV causes AIDS and evidence to the contrary instead of unsourced charts and such. I think I noted it in one of my posts.
Glass Does Not Flow. Except in Space?
FReepmail me if you want on or off my health and science ping list. Anyone can post any unposted link as they see fit.
ASSUMPTIONS, ASSUMPTIONS, ASSUMPTION!
I read your links and they don't establish anything other than AIDS patients are living longer than AIDS patients before, but that their lives are still being cut short an average of 20 years compared to the general population.
Having said that, your study *assumes* that HAART chemotherapy drugs are prolonging life simply because people with AIDS are living longer. However, this data can be flipped on its head. From the perspective that nucleoside anologues such as AZT kill people, the equal and opposite conclusion can be reached. That is, that the new HAART chemotherapy drugs are killing people more slowly than AZT monotherapy alone. But let's not forget, HAART drugs are generally two parts nucleoside analogue (AZT, etc) and one part protease inhibitor (or one part reverse transcriptase inhibitor). Thus, the dosage of AZT (and its sister drugs) are being reduced, but they still make up the majority of the dosage. The only way to resolve this issue would be to compare those on HAART to a control group of unmedicated HIV-positives.
Another factor that needs to be considered is that the CDC revised the clinical definition of AIDS in 1993 to include people with T-cell counts lower than 200. According to David Rasnick:
“...you don't even have to have a disease to be a full-blown AIDS case. You have two laboratory tests fewer than 200 CD4 cells per microliter of blood, and have antibodies to HIV, and have no other symptoms. No indication of illness other than laboratory tests and you're a full-blown AIDS case. Well over 60% of all new AIDS cases in the USA have no symptoms of the illness, but yet they're full-blown AIDS cases by the 1993 definition. And that's been true for over 50% of the AIDS cases in the past 4 or 5 years, having no symptoms of the disease.”
http://www.purewatergazette.net/rasnickinterview.htm
This, combined with lower nucleoside analogue dosages could easily explain why HIV-positive people are living longer.
Your study also points out that AIDS patients with a history of IV drug use die faster than those who don't—perfectly in line with Duesberg’s chemical-AIDS hypothesis.
And finally, their was a drastic decline in the growth of AIDS mortality a full year before HAART was even approved. How do you explain that???
http://www.avert.org/usastaty.htm
I've got to run. I have a lot more that I would like to add, but I have run out of time for today. I look forward to your response—GGG
PS You never did answer the following studies on HAART in Europe and North America. Nor did you answer the Tanzania study. So much for the “increased longevity and decreased mortality” of those who go on HAART:
==Why do the highly active antiretroviral therapy(HAART) drugs decrease mortality and increase longevity?
You couldn’t be more wrong about HAART chemotherapy. As it turns out, in 2006 the Lancet published a study of European and North American AIDS patients on HAART drugs (the largest of its kind, with hundreds of investigators listed). In the discussion section of the study the Lancet investigators admit the following with respect to AIDS cocktail/HAART drugs:
“However, there was no corresponding decrease in the rates of AIDS, or death, up to 1 year of follow-up. Conversely, there was some evidence for an increase in the rate of AIDS in the most recent period.”
http://www.duesberg.com/articles/2006,%20Lancet,%20HIV%20treatment%20resp..pdf
Now READ THIS. This study on HAART/(ART) therapy in Tanzania is nothing short of devestating to those in the AIDS establishment pushing these drugs on hapless Africans. The study is attached, but here are a few of its key points:
The cohort was 320 “treatment naive” patients placed on Anti-Retroviral Therapy (ART) between October 2003 and November 2006. Most (223) were women, some were as young as 15, the majority were between 25 and 34 years of age. Most were severely malnourished, had thrombocytopenia (low blood platelet count) and varying degrees of anemia.
Overall, 95 patients died, 59 of them within 3 months of starting the regimens.
From the paper:
“Conclusion: Mortality was found to be high, with the majority of deaths occurring within 3 months of starting ART. Anemia, thrombocytopenia and severe malnutrition were strong independent predictors of mortality. A prognostic model based on hemoglobin level appears to be a useful tool for initial risk assessment in resource-limited settings.”
...
One year mortality was estimated as high as 46.8% in those who were severely malnourished. This study states that other studies have confirmed the finding that severe malnutrition is correlated with death in HIV positive African patients “even after the introduction of highly active antiretroviral therapy...”
http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2334/8/52
The study goes on to say “There are some weaknesses of our study. First, mortality might be underestimated, since patients lost to follow-up probably include individuals dying at home without being reported.”
Needless to say, this study precisely matches what Duesberg has been saying all along re: African AIDS. African AIDS patients are primarily dying of malnutrition brought on by lack of food, not HIV. The HAART/ART drugs are simply killing them faster (and this will only intensify if the House version of Barack Obama’s global AIDS bill passes). The response to African AIDS should not be to put more Africans on chemotherapy. As Duesberg et al have always maintained, the surest and fastest way to cure African AIDS is to find a way to bypass their corrupt governments and FEED STARVING AFRICANS!
My so-called “unsourced” charts are nothing of the kind. They come from Duesberg’s papers on AIDS. All you have to do is right click on them and go to properties to see where they came from—GGG
Virusmyth.com? I can see why you would not list this looney tunes site or Duesberg as the author. Yeah, looney tunes is the right word when I see a statement that HIV doesn’t exist and I’m looking at a photo of an HIV. Or that there are no documents showing HIV causes AIDS. No, only hundreds, and not on some conspiracy webpage.
About 10.4% of the entire African-American male population in the United States aged 25 to 29 was incarcerated, by far the largest racial or ethnic group
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0881455.html
“The paper, appearing this week in the American Sociological Review, estimates that 20 percent of all black men born from 1965 through 1969 had served time in prison by the time they reached their early 30s. By comparison, less than 3 percent of white males born in the same time period had been in prison. “
‘snip’
The incarceration rate for black men born in 1945-49 was 10.6 percent by the time they were in their early 30s, but increased to 20.5 percent for those born in 1965-69. Among white men the overall risk of imprisonment grew from 1.4 percent to 2.9 percent over the same time period.
http://www.uwnews.org/article.asp?articleID=4393
That’s a ridiculous analogy. “Deep skin punctures” occur accidentally. OTOH unprotected sex is a choice.
AIDS is a preventable illness sucking up precious health care dollars it does not merit, at least in US. Africa is another story.
Foster parents can not get HIV status of children they are caring for. Strange way to treat an epidemic. The whole thing is politicized beyond belief, and calls into question any claim of an honest effort at eradication.
Big AIDS needs to be taxed!
Work hard all of your life, pay the bills and rent, send the kids too college.
But, suck one big one, just once, and you're gay forever!
You completely misread the study you refer to at “Biomedcenter”.
The criteria for treating the patients was that they be in the final stages of AIDS, WHO stage 3 and 4 as described here,
WHO Stage 3
· Weight loss > 10% of body weight
· Unexplained chronic diarrhoea > 1 month.
· Unexplained prolonged fever (intermittent or constant > 1 month.
· Candidiasis, oral.
· Candidiasis, vulvovaginal for > 1 month
· Oral hairy leukoplakia.
· Pulmonary tuberculosis.
· Severe bacterial infections such as pneumonia or pyomyositis.
· Bed ridden for < 50% ofthe day during the last month. WHO - AIDS
WHO stage 4
· Bed ridden for > 50% of the day during the last month.
· Candidiasis of the oesophagus, trachea, bronchi or lungs.
· Cryptococcus, extrapulmonary
· Cryptosporidiosis with diarrhoea for > 1 month.
· Cytomegalovirus disease of an organ other than the liver, spleen or lymph nodes.
· Herpes simplex infection, mucocutaneous for > 1 month or visceral for any duration.
· HIV dementia (encephalopathy).
· Isosporiasis with diarrhoea for > 1 month.
· Kaposi’s sarcoma
· Lymphoma
· Mycobacterium tuberculosis - extrapulmonary
· Mycobacteriosis- atypical and disseminated.
· Mycosis - disseminated histoplasmosis or coccidioidomycosis.
· Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia.
· Progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy.
· Salmonella septicaemia (non-typhoidal)
· Toxoplasmosis of the brain.
· Wasting syndrome due to HIV.www.link.med.ed.ac.uk/ridu/hivstage.pdf -”
What malnutrician they had was not from lack of availability of food but due the opportunistic infections caused by late stage AIDS, also called “slim” disease since suffers of AIDS, and the patients were positive, loose weight, noticebly so.
So your characterization of this study as confirming Duesberg’s idea of malnutrician causes AIDS is exactly backwards, it was the late stages of AIDS with the infections and diarrhoea that produced the malnutrician.
Given that the patients were at an advanced stage of AIDS high mortality rates don’t seem surprising.
Here is the discussion presented on the study cited:
“Discussion
Mortality was high in this cohort, and most of the deaths occurred within 3 months of starting ART. Severe and moderate anemia, thrombocytopenia and severe malnutrition were found to be independent predictors of mortality. The high early mortality observed in our study is in line with other similar studies from resource-limited settings [8-15]. Causes of death were not investigated in the present study; however, in a study from South Africa wasting syndrome, TB, acute bacterial infections, malignancies and immune reconstitution disease were the major causes of death [14]. In our cohort more than half of the patients had clinical AIDS at enrollment into HIV care, and other African ART programs have also reported high rates of advanced disease [8-12,14,15]. Stigma and delay in seeking health care, lack of voluntary testing and counseling services, and health system delays in referral and ART initiation are possible explanations. Thus, priority must be given to identify HIV-infected individuals and start treatment earlier in the course of their illness, before they develop severe opportunistic infections.
Anemia was a strong predictor of mortality in our study. Patients with severe anemia had nearly 15 times higher risk of dying during the first year on ART compared to those with a normal hemoglobin level. Several studies from Europe and North America have shown that anemia is an independent predictor of mortality in patients on ART, even after controlling for CD4 cell count and viral load [22-24]. Recently, studies from developing countries have found the same association [9,13]. Indeed, in the largest African cohort study published to date, severe anemia (hemoglobin <8 g/dL) was the strongest independent predictor of mortality in 16 198 patients receiving ART in Zambia [13].
It is uncertain whether the association between anemia and mortality is causal or whether anemia is rather a marker of progressive HIV disease. It is known that the incidence of anemia increases with progression of HIV infection [23]. Furthermore, anemia can be a feature of certain opportunistic diseases, like disseminated mycobacterial infection and parvovirus B19 [25]. Several other etiologic factors may be involved in the development of HIV-associated anemia, including micronutrient deficiencies, immunological myelosuppression, impaired erythropoietin production and blood loss from intestinal opportunistic disease [25]. The role of iron supplementation is controversial, as some reports have suggested adverse effects of iron excess in HIV-infected individuals in industrialized countries [26,27]. On the contrary, recovery from anemia after erythropoietin treatment has been associated with improved survival [23,24], but high costs limit its use in poor countries. More recently, ART has been shown to significantly reduce HIV-associated anemia in developed countries [28,29]; however, this has not yet been investigated in rural Africa. Further studies are needed to explore possible interventions against HIV-associated anemia in resource-limited settings, including the role of iron supplementation.
Malnutrition was another strong, independent predictor of mortality in our study. Estimated one year mortality was nearly 50% among patients with severe malnutrition. Previously, studies from industrialized countries have shown that malnutrition in HIV infection is associated with morbidity and mortality, even after the introduction of highly active antiretroviral therapy in the late 1990s [30-32]. More recently, studies from developing countries have found that malnutrition is an independent predictor of mortality in patients starting ART [8,12,13,33]. However, it is not clear whether targeted therapy for malnutrition will result in improved survival [34]. Studies of nutritional interventions in HIV patients are urgently needed in developing countries, where malnutrition is often a result of poverty and food insecurity.
We found a reduced risk of death in patients starting ART in later calendar years compared with the initial period 2003–04. A possible explanation is that many patients with severe AIDS were included in the initial period, as this was the first clinic to offer ART in the area. However, since the risk reduction persisted after controlling for clinical stage, we believe that it may also be attributed to improved skills among local staff managing HIV patients. The decline in mortality over time supports our experience that non-physician clinicians can be trained to follow-up and treat HIV-infected patients.
To our knowledge, thrombocytopenia has never previously been shown to predict mortality in African patients on ART, although a few studies from North America have described an increased risk of disease progression and death [35,36]. Further research is needed to confirm our findings. WHO stage IV was not significantly associated with mortality in our study, in contrast to previous reports [1,8,11-14]. However, the comparison group was almost entirely composed of WHO stage III patients, which would weaken the statistical effect of WHO stage IV on mortality. Furthermore, the accuracy of clinical staging is probably quite variable in rural Africa. It is interesting that simple and more objective indicators identified in the present study appear to have a better predictive ability than clinical stage.
A prognostic model based on hemoglobin level had a strong predictive power in our study, separating the patients into low, low intermediate, high intermediate and high risk groups (Figure 2). Previously, similar survival curves for hemoglobin levels have been reported in European HIV patients, although anemia occurred less frequently [22]. Hemoglobin is a simple and inexpensive laboratory test, which can be performed even in rural, basic clinics. We believe it can be used as a simple and practical tool for initial risk assessment in the absence of CD4 cell count and viral load. Such early prognostic information would allow a more targeted search for opportunistic infections and closer follow-up in high-risk individuals, thus reducing excess mortality. Although the exact mortality figures from the present study can not necessarily be applied to other populations, we believe the concept of using hemoglobin level to identify patients with a poor prognosis can be used elsewhere. This simple prognostic model should be tested out in other African settings to assess its generalizability.
There are some weaknesses of our study. First, mortality might be underestimated, since patients lost to follow-up probably include individuals dying at home without being reported. Although the proportion of patients lost to follow-up in the present study (9.7%) was comparable to other African studies [12,13], data quality would be improved with better cohort retention. Second, the results might be affected by selection bias towards patients with more severe disease, since the study was conducted in a hospital setting. Third, some patients measured baseline hemoglobin shortly after ART initiation, which might have led to an overestimation of the prevalence of anemia in patients with a ZDV-based regimen. However, post-ART hemoglobin was only employed in a small number of patients, and it is unlikely that this has introduced any systematic bias into the study. Fourth, it is known that the generalizability of a prognostic system can be impaired if important independent predictors are left out [37]. We lacked reliable CD4 cell counts and viral loads, which are established predictors of morbidity and mortality in patients on ART [1]. However, our results strongly suggest that simple and available measurements can be useful alternative prognostic markers.
The main strength of our study is that it was carried out in a rural African hospital with use of national staff and inclusion of all eligible patients. Most other African ART studies have been performed in urban areas [9-11,13-15], in research settings with strict inclusion and exclusion criteria [38], or with support from an international non-governmental organization [8,10,12]. We believe that our results better reflect the reality in a rural hospital in sub-Saharan Africa, and thus may be applicable to other similar settings.”
The malnutrician suffered was a result not a cause.
Are they nuts?
How soon before ABC or CBS does an honest News segment on the dangers of teen gay sex?
If the MSM was truthful they would explain the large numbers of children born to couples using condoms before the invention of birth control pills. And women can't get pregnant every day of the month - like teenages can get AIDS every day of the month.
Is the MSM pushing the "safe sex condom" lie so they can have access to the young?
Apples and oranges. Practically nobody would voluntarily step on a rusty nail if they could help it - when this or other incidents that largely contribute to the contraction of tetanus occur, they are accidental and often unavoidable. Likewise, catching the common cold is often unavoidable since most everybody will with fair regularity have to interact with crowds of people, and no amount of hand-washing can protect against the guy who sneezes on a crowded elevator.
AIDS, on the other hand, is pretty much only transmittable if you are engaging in unprotected sex (hetero or homo) or are using dirty needles for intravenous drug use. In other words - ENTIRELY avoidable behaviours.
To say that these other diseases are behaviour-driven in the same way that AIDS is is simply sand-poundingly stupid.
Finally, you might want to give the following article a read. Pay particular attention to how they diagnose Africans with AIDS. Very disturbing:
Reprinted from the Weekly Dig, June 4, 2003
Africa: Treating Poverty with Toxic Drugs
By Liam Scheff
"As to diseases, make a habit of two things — to help, or at least to do no harm."--5th Century B.C.E. Greek Physician, regarded as the father of medicine.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO) and UNAIDS, 42 million people around the world are infected with HIV, and nearly 22 million people in Africa have died of AIDS. But AIDS isn't a single disease; it's a collection of diseases. When people are said to die of AIDS, they're known to die of a particular disease or condition, such as pneumonia, tuberculosis, malaria or basic malnutrition. AIDS researchers claim that HIV plays a role in the development of these illnesses, but in spite of this claim, 20 years of AIDS research has failed to prove causation between HIV infection and any so-called AIDS disease (as explored in “The AIDS Debate” parts one and two). So why do we call them AIDS deaths?
In the US, AIDS is defined as a collection of 29 previously-known conditions including yeast infections, hepatitis, the flu, pneumonia, tuberculosis and Kaposi's Sarcoma. These conditions are not known to be caused by HIV. Nevertheless, the one thing that classifies any one of these conditions as AIDS is a positive HIV-antibody test.
But even if HIV was found to cause these previously known conditions, a problem remains. The HIV-antibody tests do not diagnose actual HIV-infection. Instead, they look for non-specific antibody reactions in your blood to proteins in the HIV-test. The test manufacturers claim that the proteins stand in for HIV, but in reality, none of the test proteins have been proven to be specific to HIV. These tests are, in fact, so nonspecific that they cross-react with nearly 70 other documented conditions, including the flu, previous vaccinations, blood transfusions, arthritis, alcoholic hepatitis, drug use, yeast infections and even pregnancy, as well as conditions endemic in Africa: tuberculosis, parasitic infection, leprosy and malaria. Because no HIV test can actually find HIV, not a single HIV-test has been approved by the FDA for diagnosing HIV-infection.
In light of this nonspecific, cross-reacting test, how does the World Health Organization (WHO) diagnose AIDS in Africa?
Simple: they don't require any test at all. In 1985, the WHO created a new definition of AIDS for African nations and third world countries. The WHO's “Bangui Definition” allows Africans with common physical symptoms including diarrhea, fever, weight loss, itching and coughing to be automatically designated as AIDS patients, with no HIV test. But these very symptoms define life for the majority of Africans who lack essentials like sufficient food, safe drinking water, proper sanitation and basic medical care. These symptoms are also synonymous with the biggest killers on the continent: malaria, infectious diarrhea and tuberculosis.
Western AIDS organizations are working to get toxic AIDS drugs into the hands of African governments, but what's the use of potentially deadly AIDS pharmaceuticals to people suffering from poverty-related diseases like chronic tuberculosis and malaria infection, or to pregnant mothers whose blood cross-reacts with the nonspecific HIV tests?
To answer these questions, I spoke with AIDS researchers who've worked in Africa and studied the African AIDS epidemic.
Dr. Christian Fiala is a medical doctor and specialist in obstetrics and gynecology in Vienna. He's worked extensively in Uganda and Thailand researching AIDS.
Dr. Rodney Richards was one of the founding scientists for the biotech company Amgen where he helped develop some of the first HIV tests. Richards currently works full-time researching AIDS.
The interviews were conducted separately and integrated into a dialogue. Individual points-of-view belong to individual speakers.
How is AIDS diagnosed in Africa?
Christian Fiala: Your readers may be surprised to learn that AIDS in Africa is diagnosed completely differently than in Europe or the US. In Africa, an AIDS diagnosis can be made based on commonly occurring physical symptoms alone. This is ironic, because AIDS is a collection of diseases, and has no uniform symptoms. Even the co-founder of HIV theory, Luc Montagnier, admits that AIDS has no specific clinical symptoms.
How was this new AIDS definition devised?
Fiala: In 1985 the WHO held a meeting in Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic. A WHO official, Joseph McCormick, wrote about it in his book Level 4: Virus Hunters of the CDC.
He wrote: “If I could get everyone at the WHO meeting in Bangui to agree on a single, simple definition of what an AIDS case was in Africa, then, imperfect as the definition might be, we could actually start counting the cases...”
This is what's known as the Bangui Definition.
How does the Bangui definition define AIDS?
Fiala: There are two categories of symptoms, major and minor. A patient is given an AIDS diagnosis when they have two major symptoms and one minor symptom. The major symptoms are weight loss, chronic diarrhea and chronic fever. The minor symptoms include coughing and generalized itching.
Let me clarify, based on the WHO's definition, if you have a fever, a cough and diarrhea in Africa, then you have AIDS?
Fiala: That's correct.
That seems absurd.
Fiala: It is. It's more absurd when you understand how common these symptoms are in resource-poor settings like sub-Saharan Africa. To begin with, less than 50 percent of Africans have access to safe drinking water. Over 60 percent have no sanitation. Most African villages don't have sewage systems. Human and animal excrements mix with the water supply. People drink this water and ingest infectious parasites and bacteria. As a result, dysentery is endemic.
When your intestines are full of infectious microbes, you'll likely develop a fever. Your body will try to purge itself by expelling the bacteria as quickly as possible. This is infectious diarrhea, and it's incredibly common in Africa.
Diarrhea drains liquid, salts, minerals and nutrients from the body. It weakens the immune system. When you have no safe water, you'll have diarrhea chronically. When you have chronic diarrhea, you can't help but to lose weight.
At this point, you've fulfilled the major symptom criteria in the African definition for AIDS. So you need one minor symptom, like generalized itching or coughing. In Uganda, a so-called “AIDS epicenter,” 80 percent of houses have floors made of packed soil or cow dung. An entire family lives on this floor. There are, on average, seven children per family, all living in this room. This is not what we in the US and Europe call proper housing, and it's easy to see how a problem like “generalized itching” might come up. At this point, an African suffering from itching, diarrhea and weight loss should be - according to the WHO - officially reported as an AIDS patient. The Bangui Definition simply relabels symptoms of poverty as AIDS.
The second problem with the Bangui Definition is Tuberculosis. TB is very widespread in Africa. It's a bacterial infection that infects the lungs. TB is spread by coughing, and it's highly infectious. The typical symptoms of Tuberculosis are fever, weight loss and coughing. This is exactly what is required for an AIDS diagnosis.
So if you have Tuberculosis in Africa, you can be diagnosed with AIDS?
Fiala: That's correct. According to the WHO, the typical symptoms of TB define AIDS in Africa.
Another problem with the Bangui Definition is malaria. Malaria is the most widespread disease in Africa and tropical countries. It's the leading cause of death in Uganda. It's spread by mosquitoes, so people are reinfected several times a year. A great many people die every year, while the rest develop a relative immunity, even though it's wearing away at them. The symptoms of malaria include fever, weight loss and fatigue. If you have a cough or itching, and you have malaria in Africa, you can be diagnosed with AIDS.
As if this wasn't problematic enough, in some African countries, such as Tanzania, health authorities have decided that a one-criteria diagnosis is all they need. A patient exhibiting just one of the major symptoms - diarrhea, fever or weight loss - can be given an AIDS diagnosis.
This is hardly scientific, and it's very different from what people are told about AIDS in Africa. The idea that there should be a different kind of AIDS for Africans or Europeans or Americans defies the scientific definition of viral infection. A single virus doesn't cause different diseases in different people or in different countries. A viral infection doesn't vary so wildly so as to create pelvic cancer in women, Kaposi's sarcoma in gay men, and tuberculosis in Africans. But this is what we're asked to believe about HIV.
What's the treatment for TB and Malaria?
Fiala: The best treatment is prevention. The most effective way to reduce all of these infectious diseases is to improve the standard of living and hygiene for local residents - to provide safe, clean water; plentiful, healthy food; proper housing and basic medical care. This is exactly how the incidence of TB and other infectious diseases was dramatically reduced in the US and Europe.
The treatment for malaria is well known and simple: treated mosquito nets that protect villages; clean, safe, non-stagnant water; and the inexpensive, highly efficient drugs that effectively fight the disease.
Why don't African Countries have clean water systems?
Fiala: You could've asked that question 100 years ago in the US and Europe. Sewage and water systems rely on economic development. We have these things in the West because we know they're absolutely essential, so we've invested money and energy in them.
Many African nations don't have the money to develop this infrastructure and modernize the villages. The money they have is being re-routed into AIDS. These countries are being pressured by international AIDS organizations to take money out of rural development and put it into AIDS education, condom distribution, abstinence campaigns and toxic AIDS pharmaceuticals.
We're told that there are nearly 30 million African AIDS patients. This is an enormous number of people. How are these cases counted?
Fiala: The United Nations AIDS organization (UNAIDS) and the WHO use various computer modeling programs to come up with their numbers.
Rodney Richards: When you read about the millions of HIV-infected in Africa, you may notice that the word “estimated” precedes the number in the official publications.
What does “estimated” mean?
Richards: All WHO/UNAIDS reports of HIV-infection in Africa are "estimates" based on HIV tests performed on blood samples taken at pregnancy clinics. These global reports are created jointly by the WHO and UNAIDS.
Why is blood taken from pregnancy clinics?
Richards: In countries with little infrastructure, medical care is very limited, and is generally reserved for the most vulnerable segment of the population, such as infants and pregnant women. Even in the poorest countries, there are pregnancy clinics serving expectant mothers and women who've just given birth.
Pregnant women regularly line up at these clinics for a check-up that includes a blood screening for syphilis. Syphilis infection is common in many African countries, and must be treated before a baby's birth, or the child could die or be severely damaged.
Once a year, UNAIDS researchers collect leftover blood samples from these clinics, and test them with a single HIV-antibody test called the Elisa. The resulting number of HIV-positive results is fed into an epidemiological computer modeling program (Epi-model) at the WHO headquarters in Geneva. The Epi-model program then extrapolates the HIV-positive test results onto the entire population - young and old; men, women and children. When we hear about the number of people infected with HIV, it's this number that's being reported.
How do reported numbers of HIV-infection correspond to actual number of people tested?
Richards: The WHO/UNAIDS tells us that there are currently 30 million HIV-positive Africans, yet less than one in a thousand of these people have ever been tested. In South Africa, the WHO/UNAIDS reports 5 million people are infected with HIV, but this number is based on only 4,000 actual HIV-positive test results from pregnant women.
But even these positive test results are hardly indicative of HIV-infection. The HIV-antibody tests used in these surveys are known to come up positive based on cross-reactions with antibodies produced from malaria, TB and parasitic infection - all common conditions in Africa. The test manufacturers themselves warn that pregnancy is a known cause of false positives.
Fiala: Testing pregnant women for HIV-infection is a self-fulfilling prophecy, but pregnant women are the only people regularly tested for HIV-infection in sub-Saharan Africa.
We're told that 28 million people worldwide and 22 million Africans have died of AIDS. How are AIDS deaths counted in Africa?
Richards: AIDS deaths are also estimates. The number of deaths is projected from the Epi-model estimate of HIV-infections. It is assumed that if a certain number of people are HIV-infected, then a certain number will die of AIDS. This assumption is based on what researchers know historically about disease progression in AIDS patients, primarily from studies done on HIV-positive IV drug abusers and male homosexuals in the US and Europe.
Are these numbers accurate?
Richards: No, the numbers have been greatly inflated. For example, the WHO/UNAIDS says that there has been 2.2 million AIDS deaths in Uganda so far, but the Ugandan Ministry of Health records a cumulative total of only 56,000 AIDS deaths since the beginning of the epidemic. The WHO's report is 33 times higher than the actual number of recorded, verified deaths.
As of the end of 2001, official government bodies in the developing world have managed to account for only 7 percent of the cumulative AIDS deaths that the WHO/UNAIDS claim have occurred. The Russian Federation can only account for only 3 percent of the UNAIDS estimate of AIDS deaths. India has 2 percent of the UNAIDS estimate. China has only 1 percent.
If I understand correctly, the number of people we're told have HIV and AIDS in Africa is actually an inaccurate computer extrapolation based on test results from non-specific, cross-reacting antibody tests given to pregnant women?
Fiala: That's correct.
And the number of AIDS deaths in Africa is a projection based on the previous estimation, and is also greatly inflated?
Richards: That is also correct.
What does an AIDS diagnosis mean for an African with TB or malaria?
Fiala: In many African clinics, basic medical supplies like antibiotics are extremely limited. A clinic may only have 10 bottles of antibiotics. AIDS patients are frequently refused antibiotic treatment, because it's assumed that they'll die, no matter what. Western doctors have made it clear that AIDS is a fatal disease. Helping them is considered a waste of scarce resources.
What's the main AIDS organization in Uganda?
Fiala: TASO - The AIDS Support Organisation. They claim to be independent, but they're heavily funded by the pharmaceutical industry. They're currently constructing buildings to prepare the ground for massive HIV testing, with this non-specific, cross-reacting test, and to distribute toxic AIDS drugs.
In Africa, 50 percent of the population has no access to clean drinking water and the vast majority lack even basic medical care. And the response from multimillion dollar AIDS organization is to promote HIV testing, give out condoms and to implement treatment with deadly AIDS drugs. These drugs are similar or identical to chemotherapy drugs used in cancer treatment. They work by stopping cell growth. They kill your body from the inside out.
Which AIDS drugs are being used in Africa?
Fiala: Boehringer, a pharmaceutical company, has been doing studies in Uganda with a drug called Nevirapine. The FDA refused approval of Nevirapine in the US for so-called mother to child transmission because it's ineffective and has deadly side effects, but this is exactly how the drug is being used in Africa - on pregnant women and unborn children.
In one drug trial, 17 percent of patients taking Nevirapine developed liver problems. A US health care worker taking Nevirapine had to have a liver transplant to save his life as a result of drug toxicity. Five women in South Africa died and dozens developed severe liver problems in a combination AIDS drug trial that included Nevirapine.
The manufacturer's warning label for Nevirapine itself states that patients taking the drug have experienced: “Severe, life-threatening and in some cases fatal hepatotoxicity [liver damage],” and “severe, life-threatening skin reactions, including fatal cases.”
These are the most toxic drugs known to medicine, and they're being applied to the most vulnerable part of the population - pregnant mothers, unborn children and newborns - all based on a faulty test, or no test at all, while their actual food, shelter and water needs continue to be ignored.
What would actually help Africans is infrastructure development: proper sanitation, safe water, basic medical care and plentiful, nutritive food. This is simple, clear and logical. What's astounding is that the UN is recommending just the opposite.
In 1999 the UNAIDS commission gave its official recommendations to a meeting of finance ministers representing various African countries. The UN's exact recommendations to African nations: to redirect billions of dollars from health, infrastructure and rural development into AIDS - condoms, safe sex lectures and deadly pharmaceuticals. This is not what these already suffering people need to be healthy and successful. This is exactly how to propagate death, disease and poverty.
Afterword:
If the AIDS story in Africa feels like a parody of a bureaucratic blunder, take note: In April of this year, the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) announced a new HIV testing strategy for the United States. Rather than relying on voluntary HIV-testing, federal officials are urging the testing of all pregnant women in the US, and are implementing measures to make HIV-testing a routine part of hospital visits. The CDC is promoting a rapid HIV-test for use in all federally funded clinics, as well as homeless shelters, prisons and substance abuse treatment centers.
The HIV-antibody tests are known to cross-react with antibodies produced during pregnancy, drug abuse and nearly 70 other common conditions, and no HIV test is FDA approved to diagnose HIV infection. The standard medical treatment for HIV infection is a combination of the most toxic drugs ever manufactured.
“The AIDS Debate” series has explored the scientific and sociological process that formed HIV theory, and the ramifications of a speculative theory enforced upon a trusting, uninformed public.
We must ask ourselves, are we doing the best we can for sick people? Is the best we can offer impoverished Africans AZT and Nevirapine? Is the best we can do for drug-addicted mothers is force more drugs into their system? And what about people unlucky enough to register HIV positive on these scientifically unvalidated tests. Do they deserve to be told that they have a fatal illness?
“As to diseases, make a habit of two things-to help, or at least to do no harm."
As for human beings, one thing's for sure. We can always do better.
http://www.pharmharm.com/ScheffAIDSAfrica.html
Or as Duesberg would say:
DISTINGUISHED FROM THEIR CONVENTIONAL COUNTERPARTS
According to the WHO’s Bangui definition of AIDS (Widy-Wirski et al., 1988; Fiala, 1998) and the “Anonymous AIDS Notification” forms of the South African Department of Health, African AIDS is not a specific clinical disease, but a battery of previously known and thus totally unspecific diseases, for example:
(i) “weight loss over 10%,
(ii) chronic diarrhea for more than a month,
(iii) fever for more than a month,
(iv) persistent cough,
(v) generalized pruritic dermatitis,
(vi) recurrent herpes zoster (shingles),
(vi) candidiasis oral and pharyngeal,
(vii) chronic or persistent herpes,
(viii) cryptococcal meningitis,
(ix) Kaposi’s sarcoma”
Since these diseases include the most common diseases in Africa and in much of the rest of the world, it is impossible to distinguish clinically African AIDS diseases from previously known, and concurrently diagnosed, conventional African diseases. Thus African AIDS is clinically unspecific, unlike microbial diseases, but just like some nutritionally and chemically caused diseases (see above).
http://www.duesberg.com/subject/africa2.html
The US government created AIDS to kill off black people.
Don’t you follow the Presidential campaign? ;)
I don't know why they push their cultural agenda. They believe that humans are perfectable. They are ignorant. They believe in "harm reduction" without without being honest about all the risks.
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