The End of the Line
[Image]
Insect Transmission of HIV
[Image]
Anyone who tells you categorically that AIDS is not contracted by
saliva is not telling you the truth. AIDS may, in fact, be
transmissible by saliva, tears, bodily fluids, and mosquito
bites.
[Image] --Dr. William Haseltine, Chief of the Division of
Retrovirology, Harvard University
Question: Reports indicate that as many as 40% of the AIDS-infected
children in parts of Africa have AIDS-free mothers; how did they become
infected?
Answer: Many of them became infected by insect bite.
Every major plague in history has been tied to some type of environmental
factor. Cholera and typhoid are spread through contaminated water.
Tuberculosis is commonly spread through fomites (towels, dishes, etc.) and
aerosol water droplets spewed into the air through coughing and sneezing.
One sneeze, for example, can expel 50,000 micro-droplets of water at up to
'00 miles per hour traveling many feet away from the person who sneezes.
Each one of these droplets is capable of carrying the disease. Smallpox was
transmitted by fomites and food. With every other epidemic in history --
plague, yellow fever, typhus, malaria, denge fever, etc. -- insects were
the vector of transmission.
A study in Zaire determined that children with malaria were several times
more likely to test positive for AIDS. The only way to get malaria is
through mosquito bites. The Pasteur Institute performed a study in '989
which showed that 30% of the mosquitoes in tested in Africa were infected
with HIV. Lab studies in the U.S. have shown that mosquitoes which are
allowed to feed on HIV-infected blood still retain active viruses in the
blood cells they have consumed for up to 8 days. Many types of mosquitoes
have a flying range of about 40 miles.
There are two main methods that the virus can be transmitted by insect
bite: mechanical and biological. Blood products that remain on the biting
mouth parts of the insect can be introduced into a new host simply through
the mechanical act of biting through the victimıs skin. The virus can also
reside comfortably in the saliva and digestive fluid of the insect and can
be infused into subsequent victims through the mouth/feeding tube during
the biting/feeding process at any time.
At this point in time, over 80 different species of virus are known to be
transmitted to humans by mosquitoes and other blood-sucking insects such as
fleas, ticks, head lice, biting flies, etc.
Dr. Jean Claude Chermann of the Pasteur Institute, in Paris, reported he
has located the DNA of the AIDS virus in field specimens of virtually every
African insect species that bites humans. He further determined that 30% of
the insects tested contained the AIDS virus itself. This is particularly
significant because in most insect-borne diseases only 3% of the insects
are routinely found to be infected. This means that the AIDS virus is ten
times more concentrated in these insects than usually considered necessary
for insect transmission of a disease.
AIDS infectivity research pioneer Dr. William T. O'Connor (Chapter 7, AIDS
Exposed ) made the following statement on insect transmission of HIV among
humans:
If 'they' knew that insects could spread HIV, 'they' would
certainly protect themselves, too, wouldnt 'they'? And 'they
wouldn't hide that information, would 'they'!? Well, here's the
'they:' You mentioned the Pasteur Institute, it wasn't so much
the Pasteur Institute, it was Dr. Jean-Claude Chermann who went
to Africa and did the studies and found that HIV was in every
insect that had contact with human blood. The...question is: can
that (HIV) come out of their genome? Is it first spread through
to the male line and is it found in the non-bloodsucking
mosquitoes...the male mosquitoes? Guess what? It was in the male
population of mosquitoes.
The big question is, can active, infective viral particles get
out of that (male) mosquito? When Jean-Claude Chermann was asked
by me, in person, when I met him in Marseilles and toured his
facility, he said he had received death threats. And he elected
to stop studying it.
The scientific question as to whether insects can carry HIV is
(officially) unanswered. And it is unanswered because the leading
virologist in the world (on the subject) cared more about his
family and himself. I don't blame him! If somebody told me, 'You
keep up that line of research and we will kill you,' I'd stop,
too.
In Africa, in '88, no one was infected, not even the prostitutes.
Now, in Central Africa, you can see up to 60% of given
populations infected. I'm saying that in a decade, you can't rely
on just sex (transmission) to do that. And it isn't hard to
catch! That is what Surgeon General Koop told us, 'Hard to catch!
Hard to catch! You have to have sex with someoneıs rectum to get
it. Or, inject blood or drink a quart of saliva in order to even
get a probability of one viral particle infecting you.' Well, all
of that was lies! But yet, he was the Surgeon General and he gets
$10,000 per speaking engagement. He didn't do so badly, did he?
Internationally recognized AIDS researcher, Dr. Robert Strecker (Chapter 2
AIDS Exposed ), had the following response when asked the simple question:
Can insects transmit this virus?
Oh, absolutely yes! If you look at the relatives of the AIDS
virus, known close relatives including: Bovine Leukemia virus,
Visna virus, Equine Infectious Anemia virus, Encephalitis
virus...all of them are vector borne...all of them are
transmitted by insects. And AIDS, coming from Bovine Leukemia
virus and Visna virus, would be out of character if it were not
transmitted by insects.
In addition, mosquitoes are known to ingest about 5-8 white blood
cells during each feeding, which are known to survive intact in
the stomach of a mosquito for up to 8 days. And a mosquito has a
range, in some cases, of up to 40 miles, and during the next
feeding those white blood cells are easily regurgitated into the
new host.
The burden of proof lies on anybody who says that AIDS is not
transferred by mosquitoes. Of course, they always say, 'Well,
there's no evidence of that.' The truth of the matter is they
really havenıt looked at it. It's a very simple test: we will let
1,000 mosquitoes feed on AIDS-infected blood, then we'll let them
stick their hand into the cage and be bitten by the mosquitoes
and well then see if they contract AIDS. A very simple test...but
nobody has yet agreed to do it!
Does all of this mean that if you are bitten by a mosquito you should run
down for an AIDS test? No. It means, however, that one should be aware that
biting insects transmit many viruses and bacteria from person to person and
that they certainly CAN transmit HIV. As the number of infected continues
to increase in the U.S. raising the chances of insects vectoring HIV, it
becomes incumbent upon anyone who wishes to stay well to consider insect
bites to be a serious matter, especially in urban areas with high rates of
AIDS.
Certainly, HIV infected individuals do not always have the same amount of
viral load in their bloodstream during their illness and could be bitten
but not yield any infected blood cells to the insect in question.
Furthermore, some species of biting insects feed and then digest before
feeding again. But for how long do which insects go between feedings? When
one considers how many children in Africa, for instance, have AIDS and come
from AIDS-free households, insects must be considered as a prime factor in
their infections. Dr. Jean-Claude Chermanns research stands on its own.
Human Bite Transmits HIV (6-24-96)
Describing this case in the British Journal of Medicine, The Lancet,
Eastern European researchers reported that a 47-year old man who had HIV
and advanced AIDS had a seizure at his neighbor's house. The neighbor, a
53-year old man, put his fingers into the infected man's mouth in an
attempt to open his airway and help him breath, said Dr. Ludvik Vidmar, an
infectious disease specialist at the Clinical Center in the Republic of
Slovenia.
The man with AIDS subsequently bit the neighbor on his hand, splitting one
of his fingernails and leaving teeth imprints on his skin, although the
bite wound did not bleed. The healthy man who had been bitten noticed that
there was blood on the AIDS victim's lips caused when he bit his own
tongue, Vidmar said.
Although the man initially tested negative for HIV, his doctors assumed he
had the disease anyway and started him on a course of AZT treatment only 10
hours after the incident. The reason: standard blood tests (ELISA and
Western Blot) often are not accurate until weeks or months after infection
has begun when the body mounts its antibody response against the virus.
The good neighbor tested positive for HIV 54 days after being bitten. The
AIDS victim who had the seizure died 13 days after biting his friend. The
bitten neighbor had been married for 23 years and said he had no other sex
partner and that his wife was HIV-negative. He denied ever injecting drugs
and had never had a blood transfusion, Vidmar stated.
[Image]
[go to Homepage] Homepage
Email [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[go to Political Intrigue] AIDS Exposed
