AIDS Research – Science or Consensus?

October 13, 2010

Oct 13 Toronto – The hypothesis that the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) is caused by an exogenous retrovirus, the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), initially proposed in the early 1980s, has exclusively dominated AIDS research for the past 25 years, although many investigators have repeatedly stressed the lack of scientifically acceptable verification of this hypothesis.  Alerted to the numerous shortcomings of the official retroviral hypothesis by eminent retrovirologist Peter Duesberg, a group of AIDS “Rethinkers,” founded by molecular biologist Charles Thomas in 1991, called for the “Scientific Reappraisal of the HIV/AIDS Hypothesis” in 1996.

Prof. Etienne de Harven MD

This group Rethinking AIDS released a mission statement co-signed by thousands of scientists and concerned citizens, including Nobel laureates Walter Gilbert and Kary Mullis.  Other well-respected scientists, notably Sonnabend, Stewart, Lang, Papadopulos, Rasnick, and Geshekter and distinguished scientific writers such as Celia Farber, John Lauritsen, Neville Hodgkinson, Joan Shenton, Christine Maggiore, Renaud Russeil, Djamel Tahi Jean-Claude Roussez, and Janine Roberts have also described the multiple failings of the HIV hypothesis. Between 1992 and 2000, another group based in London, UK, made highly significant contributions to scientific/public education by publishing magazine, under the leadership of Huw Christie.  A medical team directed by Eleni Papadopulos in Perth, Australia, has also presented information questioning the validity of the HIV hypothesis.

In May 2000, the controversy concerning HIV and the antiretroviral (ARV) drugs used to treat it became the topic of international inquiry when President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, convened a debate between 35 academic scientists, “Orthodoxers” as well as “Rethinkers” together.  A similar debate took place in 2003 at the European Parliament in Brussels, Belgium, when Paul Lannoye, a Belgian member of parliament, organized a public debate on “AIDS in Africa.”

Reports by AIDS Rethinkers are readily accessible on numerous websites, the early and most significant ones being VirusMyth, Rethinking AIDS, The Perth Group, Sidasante, and Heal.org.  In spite of innumerable scientific and public conferences and publications by AIDS Rethinkers, many in the medical community either ignore, or bluntly reject the existence of any HIV controversy, or claim that AIDS “denialism” undermines AIDS prevention.  As a result, the monumental budgets allocated throughout the world to combat AIDS have been, and still are totally and exclusively restricted to HIV research.  This can neither be explained nor justified by the lack of alternative hypotheses of AIDS causation, since non-viral factors (chemical, pharmacological, nutritional, and behavioral) associated with the clinical symptoms attributed to AIDS have been well documented and reviewed by others.

The retroviral hypothesis linking HIV to AIDS received a precipitous acceptance, not on the basis of scientifically verifiable data, but based on a so-called “consensus”—a consensus enthusiastically supported by the pharmaceutical industry.  This review will focus primarily on the scientific facts (or artifacts) that impact the credibility of AIDS research.  ( Full Text.)

Etienne de Harven, MD,  (Brussels University-ULB 1953) became a full member of Sloan Kettering Institute, New York, N.Y., in 1968, and is emeritus professor of pathology, University of Toronto, Ontario. The Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons published his report this month.

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