HIV and AIDS: Questions of Scientific and Journalistic Responsibility

26

HIV AND AIDS

'come out' publicly about their concerns. More than 450 have put
their names to a letter demanding a reappraisal of the
conventional view, arguing that the HIV hypothesis is at best
unproven, at worst discredited..."
Most of the names are American-based, but overall the list
spans 23 countries.
It is the tip of an iceberg of dissent. The group's newsletter has
a mailing list of more than 2,000...
Signatories of the reappraisal letter are united in wanting a
change in direction; they differ in the extent to which they reject
the HIV theory.
Some, like Dr. Charles Thomas, a molecular biologist and
former Harvard professor of biochemistry, say it is complete
nonsense...
Others, like Dr. Lawrence Bradford, a biology professor in
Atchison, Kansas, and Dr. Roger Cunningham, a microbiologist
and director of the centre for immunology at the State University
of New York at Buffalo, think the virus could be one factor among
many, but maintain an unbiased reassessment is urgently needed.
"Unfortunately," Cunningham says, "an Aids 'establishment'
seems to have formed that intends to discourage challenges to the
dogma on one side and often insists on following discredited ideas
on the other."...Most of the signatories, such as Dr. Henk Loman, professor of
biophysical chemistry at the Free University in Amsterdam,
deplore the neglect of non-HIV lines of research...
Many of the scientists believe the fight against Aids was
derailed by a flaw in reasoning over HIV in which "the
hypothesis itself got incorporated in the definition of Aids." as
Dr. Kary Mullis, winner of last year's Nobel prize for chemistry,
puts it. When people fall sick and HIV is present or thought to be
present, it is called Aids; when HIV is not present, it is called
something else...
Thus did the Sunday Times keep informing its readers of the existence
of a dissident group.
Root-Bernstein in The Scientist. On 4 April 1994 The Scientist
printed an article by Robert Root-Bernstein entitled "Agenda for U.S.
AIDS Research Is Due For A Complete Overhaul". The article started
on the front page and extended over three pages inside the journal.