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I don't think we know enough about this to judge. I thought malaria was basically incurable. That is, it can be treated but it then recurs. I may be wrong about that, because what I know about malaria is way out of date.

As for experimenting on humans, it is legitimate if they are properly informed, if they are seriously ill, and if there is at least a reasonable chance that it may benefit them directly as well as others in the future. It could be that he is doing it in China because the U.S. authorities have blocked the research here; or it could be that the Chinese are using political prisoners or others without their consent, which they have been known to do.

On balance, I'm inclined to believe there may be something in this. The AIDS establishment is extremely untrustworthy and politicized and might easily oppose legitimate research for some bizarre reason of their own. Not to speak of drug company profits for AIDS drugs.

Oh no, malaria is quite curable. I'm cured! It can recur periodically (especially the vivax type) if untreated or incorrectly treated, or is a drug-resistant strain.

I found the actual study (link is in my #24) and under "methodology" the researchers state the participants signed informed consent.

I don't think Heimlich or any of the researchers claim "malariatherapy" cures HIV/AIDS, but it has an interesting effect on the immune system of HIV+ patients. Apparently, it is most effective for AIDS patients whose CD4 levels are within a certain range. From the study:

We here propose a hypothesis that malaria parasite is a special and strong natural immune regulator which has dual effects: when the host has a relatively normal level of immune status, it down regulates immune function, when host is at relatively lower immune status, it up regulates immune functions; but when host is at a very low level of immune status, it just gives rise to a transient and weak immune response. Therefore, based on our studies, malariotherapy seems more suitable for treatment of HIV-positive patients with CD4 cell level at 499~200/µL.

Well, yes, it sounds like such research has been blocked here, doesn't it? I wonder how many people (especially children) died because of the prejudice against artesunate. It's derived from a Chinese herb. Back in '92 when I had a super-drug-resistant strain of P. falciparum (the deadly type of malaria) in Cambodia, the treatment was worse than the disease. One of the German doctors who treated me felt sorry for me, and knowing I was going back to my remote island (it took me a week's travel to get to a clinic for treatment from my island) and slipped me some artesunate, explaining to me that it was "illegal" but very effective.

Soon after I arrived back to my island, the villagers summoned me to help "the dying man." He was having convulsions and the monks were already preparing his funeral. I suspected P. falciparum gone cerebral, but tested his reflexes to make sure it wasn't Tetanus (that's how bad he was). With nothing to lose (he was at death's door), I mixed the artesunate in with some Pepto Bismol and poured it down the guy's throat. In only two hours, he was sitting up and feeling fine. He never suffered any side effects, either. I was astounded. Everyone was. I became known by the people as "The White Witch of Kiri Sakor" because they considered this guy's amazing recovery as a sort of magical miracle. But it was just some little Chinese pills in Pepto.

Some months later, I was med-evaced to Bangkok with rat bite fever (not very glamorous, I know) and what should come on the TV in my hotel room as I was recuperating but a BBC documentary on Brit doctors in Africa up in arms because the use of artesunate was not sanctioned, yet was very effective in saving lives (especially in children and cases of drug-resistant strains) where all other drugs failed and did not have the nasty and even dangerous side effects of some of other drugs used against strains resistant to standard antimaliarals.

Thanks to the pressure exerted by these Good Samaritan doctors, aresunate is now sanctioned and saving many lives.

Perhaps this "malariatherapy" may not produce a cure for HIV/AIDS in and of itself, but may produce a better understanding of the disease and lead to a cure. Who knows? If I were HIV+, after reading this study, I'd volunteer to be one of these guys' guinea pigs.

There is increasing interest in hyperthermia--whether through infection, chemicals, or contraptions where they put you in a semi coma and heat up your entire body, or take your blood out and heat it--various methods to heat the body to treat infection and cancer.

Many organisms are heat sensitive--thats why our own body makes a fever. Fever boosts the immune system as well. And many drugs are more effective in the presence of heat, such as cancer drugs and antibiotics. So...

Malaria can be cured, but sometimes it becomes chronic. I'd rather see them study HOW this works and then try to find safer ways to do it as it has wide application.