-Caveat Lector-
Thanks to Ken Jacobs, Harry Erwin, and Jim Macintosh for their responses to
my posting (2/7/99) on the supposed chimp vector for HIV transmission to
humans.
My apologies for the delay in responding.
Ken wrote (2/7/99)
>>But
themost telling problem . . . is that
if the transfer happened only in the 1940s . . .
then either, 1) the local populations refrained from
chimp-eating before then (an unlikely proposition) or, 2) the earlier
hunters were more adept and managed never to cut themselves accidentally
while butchering a chimp (equally unlikely).<<
According to African green monkey theory, the transfer occurred at least as
early as 1600. That's the approximate date of visits to Japan by Portugese
navigators, who brought black slaves and Agms with them. (Agms aren't
native to Japan Asia). Myron Essex, at Harvard, published an article in
1983 claiming (a) to have recovered HTLV from patients in Japan suffering
multiple bacteria infections (an 'AIDS-like' symptom) and (b) to have
compared HTLV with SIV and to have found similarities warranting the
inference
of mutational origin. Robert Gallo, who discovered HTLV
(human T cell lymphotrophic virus in 1980), took up this cause and, thanks
to his prestige, made it the accepted opinion. (His particular interest
was his campaign to get HTLV accepted as the cause of AIDS. At that time
the nomenclature change to HIV hadn't occurred, and the Montaigner team at
the Pasteur Institute were still hoping for acknowledgement of their
priority of discovery. Moreover, the Pasteur group had found a second AIDS
virus in Senegal--today labelled HIV-2--which enhanced their claim of
priority).
Anyhow, the Agm/HTLV vector was extremely interesting and other labs tried
to replicate Essex's work. They couldn't so doubts began to arise. Essex
set Jim Mullins (one of his subordinates) to work to vindicate the finding.
Mullins concluded, after exhaustive investigation, that the Japanese blood
samples supposedly infected by HTLV resembled SIV so closely because it WAS
SIV. In other words, contamination had occurred in Essex's lab. And there
was worse to come. The SIV was not from Agms, but from Asian macaques
living in a primate research center in a Boston suburb. There was, in
other words, a SECOND contamination. The Agm claim, then, was wholly
bogus.
This correction was published in 1987, but the prose was
so 'round-about that only insiders could understand it. For the public at
large, the Agm continued to be touted as the vector. Completely bogus, but
still good press.
Jim Mullins's detective work should have won him distinction, for to kill
an error is to win back terrain for truth. Alas, Essex stopped speaking to
him and Gallo was furious. Mullins became deeply disenchanted with the
science process as a result, left Harvard for the University of Washington,
and got out of AIDS research.
What does it all mean?
1. Once burned, twice cautious: check out the chimp vector claim to be
sure it's not the rerun of an old movie.
2. Neither Gallo nor Essex had evidence that HTLV actually caused cancer.
It was merely a surmise based on the presence of HTLV in tumor tissue.
They also had no evidence that SIV was pathogenic. So the entire scenario
was speculative. However, it was worth headlines and rapid appreciation of
biotech stock values held by Essex and Gallo.
3. The Agm theory, like the chimp theory, is a fizzer as an explanation of
the time and point of entry of HIV into the human species. Here things get
very sticky. Retroviruses exist in the dozens, perhaps hundreds, in the
human germ line. They are 'passenger' viruses, genome junk. They are not
pathogenic. (Varmus and Brown, <Retroviruses> in *Mobile DNA*, ed. Berg,
1989, pp. 90, 95). They have been in the germline for many millions of
years, perhaps 300 million. This makes them very slow viruses indeed. So
how is it that HIV suddenly kicks up such a pathogenic fuss? That's the 26
bn $$ question. Hint: Until the David Ho viral load theory of 1995, it was
accepted that HIV is present in AIDS patients only in minute amounts, and
those small numbers 'hide' in lymph nodes. This fact was one of Duesberg's
reasons for denying that HIV is pathogenic.
4. Harry Erwin cautions against citing Kary Mullis. But why, Harry? One
reason he involves himself in the debate is that the current fashion in HIV
theory, the viral load theory, is based on PRC amplification techniques
that to his mind are completely illegitimate. I might add that University
of Sydney mathematician Mark Craddock has written a critique of the
mathematics of viral load that concludes: total bollocks. Further caution:
the chimp/HIV vector work comes from the same lab as gave us the viral load
hypothesis (Shaw in collaboration with David Ho).
Ken Jacobs again, this time on AIDS journalism:
>>Finally, while I agree that jounalists' amnesia plays a large role
here, journalists are notoriously competitive. It would seem to me that
more than one of those on the HIV-beat might see "debunking" the rest of
them as a way to stand out from the pack, thereby gaining at least
fleeting fame. This being the case, why do we not hear more reminders
of all the past false alarms?<<
In fact there are a number of journalists who DO write critically: Jad
Adams, Neville Hodgkinson, John Crewsdon, Celia Farber, John Lauritsen, Tom
Bethell. Hodgkinson, as science correspondent of the London Sunday Times,
brought AIDS dissent to light in a series of features over several years.
It made the AIDS establishment in the UK spit bullets.
The experience of journalists who try to take a critical perspective is
that their material is rejected or edited out of shape. They also find
that their sources dry up: once it's known that they're critical, no one
will return their telephone calls. Worse, medical heavies denounce them to
their bosses, alleging that any departure from the "AIDS education" line
undermines public trust and thus threatens lives. And who wants to be
branded an accomplice in murder?
It's not merely journalists who are subjected to such treatment. Networks,
like NBC and CNN, are subjected to the same treatment. So are
universities. The NIH tried to blackmail the University of California into
silencing Peter Duesberg by threatening that NIH grants to UCal scientists
might just accidentally diminish. Duesberg's colleagues shunned him prior
to this threat for fear of this effect. (By shunning, they signalled to
the NIH that THEY weren't accomplices, so please don't punish us).
Anyone interested in immersing in the details of how AIDS science has, by a
combination of bribes, intimidation, and control of the media, has
extinguished independent expression of critical opinion, may read
Duesberg, Inventing the AIDS Virus
Jad Adams, The Myth of AIDS
Neville Hodgkinson, AIDS; The Failure of Contemporary Science
or consult the Rethinking AIDS website
http://www.virusmyth.com/aids/award.htm
Hiram Caton
==========================================================
We know that to err is human, but the AIDS/HIV hypothesis is one hell of a
mistake. Kary Mullis
DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER
==========
CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic
screeds are not allowed. Substance�not soapboxing! These are sordid matters
and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright
frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects
spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL
gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers;
be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credeence to Holocaust denial and
nazi's need not apply.
Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
========================================================================
Archives Available at:
http://home.ease.lsoft.com/archives/CTRL.html
http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
========================================================================
To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Om
