-Caveat Lector-
Introduction by Kary Mullis
Nobel Prize in Chemistry, I993
http://www.duesberg.com/kintro.html
IN I988 I WAS WORKING as a consultant at Specialty Labs in Santa Monica,
CA, setting up analytic routines for the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV).
I knew a lot about setting up analytic routines for anything with nucleic
acids in it because I invented the Polymerase Chain Reaction. That's why
they hired me.
Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS), on the other hand, was
something I did not know a lot about. Thus, when I found myself writing a
report on our progress and goals for the project, sponsored by the National
Institutes of Health, I recognized that I did not know the scientific
reference to support a statement I had just written: "HIV is the probable
cause of AIDS."
So I turned to the virologist at the next desk, a reliable and competent
fellow, and asked him for the reference. He said I didn't need one. I
disagreed. While it's true that certain scientific discoveries or techniques
are so well established that their sources are no longer referenced in the
contemporary literature, that didn't seem to be the case with the HIV/AIDS
connection. It was totally remarkable to me that the individual who had
discovered the cause of a deadly and as-yet-uncured disease would not be
continually referenced in the scientific papers until that disease was cured
and forgotten. But as I would soon learn, the name of that individual - who
would surely be Nobel material - was on the tip of no one's tongue.
Of course, this simple reference had to be out there somewhere.
Otherwise, tens of thousands of public servants and esteemed scientists of
many callings, trying to solve the tragic deaths of a large number of
homosexual and/or intravenous (IV) drug-using men between the ages of
twenty-five and forty, would not have allowed their research to settle into
one narrow channel of investigation. Everyone wouldn't fish in the same pond
unless it was well established that all the other ponds were empty. There
had to be a published paper, or perhaps several of them, which taken
together indicated that HIV was the probable cause of AIDS. There just had
to be.
I did computer searches, but came up with nothing. Of course, you can
miss something important in computer searches by not putting in just the
right key words. To be certain about a scientific issue, it's best to ask
other scientists directly. That's one thing that scientific conferences in
faraway places with nice beaches are for.
I was going to a lot of meetings and conferences as part of my job. I got
in the habit of approaching anyone who gave a talk about AIDS and asking him
or her what reference I should quote for that increasingly problematic
statement, "HIV is the probable cause of AIDS."
After ten or fifteen meetings over a couple years, I was getting pretty
upset when no one could cite the reference. I didn't like the ugly
conclusion that was forming in my mind: The entire campaign against a
disease increasingly regarded as a twentieth century Black Plague was based
on a hypothesis whose origins no one could recall. That defied both
scientific and common sense.
Finally, I had an opportunity to question one of the giants in HIV and
AIDS research, DL Luc Montagnier of the Pasteur Institute, when he gave a
talk in San Diego. It would be the last time I would be able to ask my
little question without showing anger, and I figured Montagnier would know
the answer. So I asked him.
With a look of condescending puzzlement, Montagnier said, "Why don't you
quote the report from the Centers for Disease Control? "
I replied, "It doesn't really address the issue of whether or not HIV is
the probable cause of AIDS, does it?"
"No," he admitted, no doubt wondering when I would just go away. He
looked for support to the little circle of people around him, but they were
all awaiting a more definitive response, like I was.
"Why don't you quote the work on SIV [Simian Immunodeficiency Virus]?"
the good doctor offered.
"I read that too, DL Montagnier," I responded. "What happened to those
monkeys didn't remind me of AIDS. Besides, that paper was just published
only a couple of months ago. I'm looking for the original paper where
somebody showed that HIV caused AIDS.
This time, DL Montagnier's response was to walk quickly away to greet an
acquaintance across the room.
Cut to the scene inside my car just a few years ago. I was driving from
Mendocino to San Diego. Like everyone else by now, I knew a lot more about
AIDS than I wanted to. But I still didn't know who had determined that it
was caused by HIV. Getting sleepy as I came over the San Bernardino
Mountains, I switched on the radio and tuned in a guy who was talking about
AIDS. His name was Peter Duesberg, and he was a prominent virologist at
Berkeley. I'd heard of him, but had never read his papers or heard him
speak. But I listened, now wide
