Sorry for the mess, why am I unable to edit my posts?
In a sense, you’re right … see my html-challenged reply to Roches.
Only mods can edit posts.
To all those attempting to debate trueskeptic and other so-called “skeptics”, I say don’t bother. I work for my government’s HIV/AIDS epidemiology division, and we often get questions from the public about this (ok, not that often, but it has happened frequently enough over the years).
We have done as much research as possible, and since we are just across the border from the US (read: Canada), we are often in contact with our CDC contemporaries in sharing information. Simple truth: the deniers have been reponded to, with accurate, credible scientific proof. ambushed beat me to it by providing just a drop in the water of the list of available resources, and makes the same points I have had to in the past with regards to deniers and their “attempts” at science and reasoning.
So my advice is to give it up, because even in the face of all the research in the world, these people will still deny what they disagree with, will never accept the truth, will say they are perfectly willing to change their view but demand either impossible evidence or more evidence to add to what they have already seen but choose to ignore. They will continue to rely on single sources (ie; the dubious website www.virusmyth.org) as the only source for counter evidence. In other words, there really is no debate.
Now I’m sure some here who are denying or arguing for better proof will attack my statements. I will refer you to ambushed’s post earlier, and you can make of that what you will, because the burden of proof is on you, as a denier, to supply some credible evidence (published, peer-reviewed research) that shows that the current evidence is completely wrong. To the rest of us, let’s not hold our breath.
Uh, the first link has several images … do you mean the Yahoo banner?
The second link was dated 1981 … yet the disputed pictures I linked to, supposedly the first images of “pure HIV”, were produced in 1997, I think. So if this is meant to engender yux (Adams), I don’t get it.
I haven’t had the chance to look at ambush’s links yet, I’d be delighted if they answered any of the dissenters’ objections. I note you haven’t either. Good enough for government work, eh?
You have much faith. Sometimes not a good thing. I hope those links are more worthwhile than the links to Yahoo I’ve been given.
“I know what you are, but what am I?”
Wow, there’s some logic. See, if those papers were on 20 different sites, instead of gathered together, they would be worth reading! Yes, I see your point.
By that you mean you have not bothered to read any of the opposing arguments I have offered. Good to see the scientific method is alive and well in billion-dollar AIDS Land.
Since I am a newly minted member of the Inquisition, please excuse me while I don my robes and hood…there.
The Galileo-quack connection has often been noted by the rational “herd”.
trueskeptic, you might benefit from reading this analysis of appeals to quack beliefs. Note the reference to Galileo. 
telemark, you missed an opportunity!
You can’t? Gee, the REST of us can. It must be a conspiracy! 
trueskeptic:
I have read ambushed’s links, many times in the past. Criticize what you will of my post, the simple truth is that the best evidence for why people are dying of these diseases that normally wouldn’t affect them is because their immune systems are suppressed by HIV. As yet, no one has presented any credible evidence to deny HIV as being the cause of AIDS, and not one of the articles or the research you or any other denier has cited has proven sufficient to refute the underlying source of the problem. HIV is defintely not completely understood yet, but it is definitely the cause of AIDS, and the burden of proof is on a denier to provide equally credible, non-“but wait, I’ve noticed a coincidence that might just corelate with an alternate view but isn’t fully understood and may be entirely spurious” research. Until then, I will happily continue to work to improve the health of my fellow citizens.
ambush, I’m not avoiding you, just tackling the shorter posts first.
OK, good question. Actually,
"the rates of new HIV infections peaked in 1982 at 7500, long before the introduction of any safe sex campaign and even longer before the introduction of anti-HIV drugs. The rates dropped quickly, finally plateauing at only 500 new infections every year from 1988 through 1997.
"Another study found that HIV rates among applicants to a government youth social service program, Job Core, were dropping steadily during the 1990’s (Valleroy 1998). All 357,443 applicants over the seven year period from 1990, to 1996 were tested for HIV antibodies. The rates for both female and male applicants in 1996 were half the rates found in 1990. Curiously, the authors still refer in their opening line to HIV as an “epidemic among youth in the United States”, even though the rates of HIV positives had been cut in half in only six years. " (PROBLEMS WITH HIV SCIENCE, Matt Irwin MD, 2001)
"According to a study authored by Mitchell Katz, the director of San Francisco’s Public Health Department, stored blood samples show that the number of people testing HIV positive in that city peaked in 1982–four years before safe sex campaigns were initiated, five years before the first “anti-HIV” treatment was approved for use (AZT) and 14 years before the release of the new AIDS cocktail drugs.
“Source: Journal of AIDS and Human Retrovirology 1997” (Christine Maggiore, AIDS Myth Busters, aliveandwell.org)
See, I knew it! Hold on, I have to check my fillings …
I’m a little confused by the whole thing. Admittedly, I don’t know that much about biology etc.
HIV is associated with AIDS in general. OK, fair enough, but that doesn’t mean it causes it does it? Correlation doesn’t equal causation.
The test for HIV is actually an anti-body test. Doesn’t this mean that your body has already fought it off?
Has it ever been demonstrated HOW HIV causes AIDS?
I think Duesberg’s central point is that other things are causing AIDS, but it’s not HIV.
For example Karposi’s sarcoma is caused by HIV. OK, fine, but why is Karposi’s sarcoma ONLY found in homosexuals? If a hetero with HIV = a homosexual with HIV = potential AIDS person, then why do some diseases only appear in homosexuals?
Now, that’s not to say that homosexual DESERVE the disease, I didn’t say that. Is it possible that nitrates, which are known immuno-suppresants, are causing this disease? Is that within the realm of possibility? I don’t honestly understand why it isn’t.
Supposedly, IV drug uses have suffered from “wasting disease” for centuries. Maybe I’m wrong on this…am I? Now though, “wasting disease” together with HIV = AIDS. But this again doesn’t mean that HIV causes AIDS.
What about the people who have HIV and never seem to get AIDS? Magic Johnson came out 13 years ago and said he had it. He’s healthy as a horse, and most of that time it was before the new anti-whatever cures out there.
Kerry Mullis said something about “the more elaborate the theory” the more likely the theory is just wrong.
Am I wrong? I don’t understand some of the technical things about biology, etc, unfortunately. I am a layman, obviously. But I understand some of their questions and thing they sound legitimate.
May be nitrites/poppers, anal sex, or combination of both? Semen introduce into bloodstream is immunosuppressive.
Journal of the InterAmerican Medical and Health Assn.
January-April 1992, Vol.1, No.1; IMMUNE IMPAIRMENT AND THE HYPOTHESIS OF THE “ACQUIRED IMMUNE DEFICIENCY CYCLE”, Dr. Maurizio Luca Moretti
"Briefly summarized, all of the following agents have been demonstrated to be immunosuppressive prior to the discovery and HIV, and all are highly associated with one or more AIDS risk groups: immunological response to semen following anal intercourse; the use of recreational drugs such as the nitrites (“poppers” and “snappers”); chronic antibiotic use (often associated with promiscuity); opiate drugs; multiple transfusions; anesthetics; malnutrition (whether caused by “gay bowel syndrome,” drug use, poverty or anorexia nervosa); multiple, concurrent infections by diverse microbes; and infection by specific viruses such as cytomegalovirus. Epstein-Barr virus, and hepatitis-B virus (all of which are as highly associated with AIDS as is HIV). (Root-Bernstein, Associate Professor of Physiology
Michigan State University)
See also: Perspectives in Biology and Medicine
Summer 1990, 33:480-500; DO WE KNOW THE CAUSE(S) OF AIDS?(Root-Bernstein)
There may not have been a staff report on the subject, but there has certainly been a column by Cecil.
What’s depressing is that MY fillings pull in Rush Limbaugh, though I’m a liberal Democrat.
I’m a little puzzled here, trueskeptic.
I did a Google search on “InterAmerican Medical and Health Association” and couldn’t find anything.
I did a PubMed search (using the extensive database provided by the National Center for Biotechnology Information) and could not find a “Journal of the InterAmerican Medical and Health Association” listed as a medical journal.
Nor could I find in PubMed a single paper authored by Maurizio Moretti.
So who are these people? A shadowy group forced into underground status by the machinations of the billion-dollar AIDS cartel?
Please clarify.
What the hell is this obsession with poppers (amyl nitrate)? Not everyone in the gay community, who engages in anal intercourse*, or has HIV/AIDS has used or uses poppers. Sheesh! Talk about spreading misinformation…
Esprix
*And for that matter, not everyone in the gay community engages in anal sex, either.
Rigorously tested and consistently confirmed scientific models are not beliefs, despite your repeated assertions. My wife is an epidemiologist and has forgotten more about disease-in-population metrics than you will ever hope to understand. You, by contrast, are merely full of shit.
Your microwave is dinging. That means you’re done.
ambushed, your first cite does not look promising. Here’s a preliminary retort:
"In the discussion period of Mellors’s lecture, I decided to return to the questions that I’d wanted Markowitz to answer, about the meaning of “viral load.” After all, that was the heart of the matter: Mellors’s call to discard clinical endpoints was only as valid as the “viral load” figures with which he wished to replace them.
For starters, I wanted to compare his answers to Markowitz’s. So I repeated my question about the relation between “viral load” and infectious doses. Mellors responded by proclaiming, "Viral load has nothing to do with infectivity!"
Ah-ha! Now I had a second HIV big shot admitting that the “viral load” figures did not indicate infectious HIV."
I don’t see at all what you mean by this. Perhaps you mean that HIV infection (which I don’t think you doubt exists; its the correlation with AIDS that you seem to be denying) should be diagnosed by culturing samples of the virus isolated from tissues. I suppose this may have some roots in pre-molecular pathology where a tissue culture might have been useful. There is little doubt in the mainstream scientific community that PCR is effective and reliable for amplification of genetic material, sometimes even for a single molecule. The resultant genetic material can then be isolated and analyzed, whether by an antibody-binding assay like ELISA, an electrophoretic method like Western blot, or even outright sequencing. PCR is not a ‘genetic trick’ than can randomly generate HIV artefacts or O.J. Simpson DNA where it is not present. Nor is it somehow flawed because it permits the use of blood- or saliva- based tests where the concentration of virus is small.
I suspect that the real reason that a blood-based test was designed was convenience, not conspiracy. It’s far easier to draw some blood for a test than to extract a tissue sample, then culture and isolate viral material for each one. Or are you just talking about the identification of HIV? Incidentally, HIV has been isolated in its whole form. Its genome has been sequenced. So, even if the initial identification was based on PCR, subsequent research was not.
Again, see here. Note that there are several testing methods available, including isolation and culture of the virus. While this is probably not commonly done, your quote above suggests that it would be impossible, or at least that researchers were stupid for not doing it.
About your claim of the effect of the new definition (the really long URL…): See here. Note this:
Of the 55,432 [54% of new cases in 1994] cases reported based on 1993-added conditions, 50,061 persons (91%) had severe human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-related immunosuppression only; 3988 (7%), pulmonary tuberculosis (TB); 1251 (2%), recurrent pneumonia; and 151 ( less than 1%), invasive cervical cancer (19 persons were reported with more than one of these opportunistic illnesses).
So this is the “AIDS is caused by a combination of immunosuppressive agents” theory. These seem to focus on gay men, IV drug users, and possibly prostitutes – you know, the kind of people God wanted to kill when he designed his latest plague (note that I’m not implying that either you or the source of the reference believes this). What about people who contract HIV from a single sexual contact, then develop AIDS? What about hemophiliac non-IV drug user non-homosexuals who developed AIDS? (or is that just the blood transfusions?)
I said obviously moralistic, not obviously wrong. The belief that AIDS is in fact caused by multiple immunosuppressive factors working synergistically is what I described: it is the belief that AIDS is caused not by a virus, but by drug use, ‘contact with semen components’, and ‘gay bowel syndrome’. In other words, by being a sodomite in itself, or at least a drug user. Also, since the “exception” of prolonged IV drug use seems to have been included to explain how heroin addicts can get AIDS without the prerequisite of gay sex, then would we expect sterile needles to cause AIDS as well? (I cannot claim with certainty that no drug user has developed AIDS without ever sharing needles.)
“You steal, you go to jail” is not analogous to “you have gay sex, you get AIDS”, because incarceration is a societal consequence of crime. A similar analogy would be more like “if you have sex in public, you go to jail” (societal consequence), or “if you steal, your hands will rot and fall off” (medical consequence). A claim that has probably actually been made is “if you steal, you are more likely to die early”, because thieves are usually socioeconomically disadvantaged and receive poorer health care, not because stealing is an inherently unhealthy activity.
Sexual activity, in contrast, could be an inherently unhealthy activity if one of the participants is infected with a pathogen; but note that the quote above refers to mere ‘contact with semen components’ (sic; the adjectival form of ‘semen’ is ‘seminal’). I suppose that contact with seminal components would be hazardous intravaginally as well. There are women who have contracted both HIV and AIDS through vaginal intercourse. Thus it should be assumed that the immunosuppressive agents found in semen, if they are the true cause of AIDS, can pass through vaginal membranes as well as the incidental and innocuous virus found in AIDS patients. This would rather odd to me, from an evolutionary point of view. Maybe the women were lying about having anal sex. Or maybe HIV causes AIDS and can penetrate rectal, vaginal, intraurethral and oral mucosal membranes, as the vast majority of research indicates.