We interrupt this newcast.......

Back on the Subject of HIV/AIDS, as another blogger a guy running "Talud" http;//taludsthoughts.blogspot.com is disscussing this topic there with my replies. Here is my latest reply.

You said...

"I think it is important to have accurate information, AZT did cause a lot of deaths, one report was 2 deaths per 1000 I think. I know that deaths were higher in 1989-1999 (I think have to recheck and I have not time right now) when AZT was prescribed as the main medicine to helping HIV patients. The fact is though that AZT did let them live a few more years than they might otherwise have had at that time"

But an newer larger study than the one you cite. The Concord study determined that...

"Concorde went on for three years, examining 1,749 HIV-positive but healthy people at 38 health centers in the U.K., Ireland, and France. Because the research lasted the longest of all AZT studies to fate, and its pedigree was unassailable (it was conducted by the highly reputable British Medical Research Council and its French equivalent), Concorde could not be dismissed. The team concluded that AZT - a highly toxic and carcinogenic drug - neither prolongs life nor staves off symptoms of AIDS in people who are HIV-antibody positive but still healthy."

Some HIV/AIDS dissenters think that instead of helping HIV/AIDS patients, AZT and its derivatives can make thing worse for the patient.

From Duesberg..

If Azt is so toxic, how is it that the incidence of infected children has decreased from 25% to 8% (in Italy and in France) in babies born to mothers who had been treated with Azt during pregnancy?

A3: Treatment of HIV-positive, pregnant women with the DNA chain terminators has reduced the incidence of HIV in their babies from 25% to 8% in France and Italy as well as in the US. This is to be expected from a drug that was designed to kill cells including those in which HIV replicates. AZT was developed over 30 years ago to kill cells for cancer chemotherapy.

The first problem with this hypothetical triumph of anti-HIV treatment is that HIV is not the cause of AIDS. The second more serious problem that AZT induces abortion, and generates birth defects in humans and causes cancer in animals born to AZT-treated mothers. For example, a study published in 1994 found that among 104 AZT treated HIV positive women, 8 aborted spontaneously, 8 had to be aborted "therapeutically", and 8 had babies with birth defects such as cavities in the chest, heart defects, extra fingers, misplaced ears, triangular faces, misformed spine, and albinism (Kumar et al., J. AIDS, vol. 7, p1034 (1994), cited in IAV).

Another assertion you make...

"A majority of HIV/AIDS cases in the US are among the Gay and Drug users in the states. Not to say all but a majority. The reason for this, and I am not sure if this holds true I am sure someone will be able to shed light if I am wrong, is that Gay men do not generally wear condoms, which would help keep the spreading of this disease down in their group. Drug users that get HIV/AIDS get it from dirty needles."

Are you impling that A.I.D.S is a lifestyle disease? Cause if so that puts you out of the mainstream arguement of the orthodox HIV/AIDS hypothesis and its espousers, they might dissagree with you. You might not get much of a probelm by people like Dr.Peter Duesberg..who's been saying that in the U.S AIDS resembles more a "Lifestyle" disease. A lifestyle disease is diferent from saying that "A.I.D.S is a pandemic,and HIV is its infectious agent,,hence HIV/AIDS is an infectious disease. An lifestyle disease might infer that there is something other than HIV that is causing AIDS...and you'll get plenty of dissagreement about that.

In Africa I think HIV/AIDS is said to be transmitted sexually, inferring that the disease can be spread by introduction into the blood stream, as you hint at least in America they say HIV/AIDS can be spread by I.V recreational drug use...If that is true, then why isn't HIV/AIDS spread by vectors like mosquitoes or something?