London, 6/8/08
A 25-year health campaign was misplaced outside the continent of Africa. But the disease still kills more than all wars and conflicts
Sunday, 8 June 2008
A quarter of a century after the outbreak of Aids, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has accepted that the threat of a global heterosexual pandemic has disappeared.
Goody! Where did it go, though?
In the first official admission that the universal prevention strategy promoted by the major Aids organisations may have been misdirected, Kevin de Cock, the head of the WHO's department of HIV/Aids said there will be no generalised epidemic of Aids in the heterosexual population outside Africa.
Misdirected? How could that be?
Dr De Cock, an epidemiologist who has spent much of his career leading the battle against the disease, said understanding of the threat posed by the virus had changed. Whereas once it was seen as a risk to populations everywhere, it was now recognised that, outside sub-Saharan Africa, it was confined to high-risk groups including men who have sex with men, injecting drug users, and sex workers and their clients.
Translation: The only "infectious disease" in history that infects only gay men, drug users, whores and Johns.
Dr De Cock said: "It is very unlikely there will be a heterosexual epidemic in other countries. Ten years ago a lot of people were saying there would be a generalised epidemic in Asia – China was the big worry with its huge population. That doesn't look likely. But we have to be careful. As an epidemiologist it is better to describe what we can measure. There could be small outbreaks in some areas."
Hmm. I wonder if this clown has ever read Gisselquist on the lack of sexual transmission of HIV in Africa or Nancy "no seroconversions" Padian in the USA.
Hey, better late than never, DeCock!
but, but. . . how can 5000 scientists be wrong?!!
"Like many other viruses, HIV recognizes no social, political or geographic boundaries". (Durban Declaration)
"The Durban declaration has been signed by over 5,000 people, including Nobel prizewinners, directors of leading research institutions, scientific academies and medical societies, notably the US National Academy of Sciences, the US Institute of Medicine, Max Planck institutes, the European Molecular Biology Organization, the Pasteur Institute in Paris, the Royal Society of London, the AIDS Society of India and the National Institute of Virology in South Africa. In addition, thousands of individual scientists and doctors have signed, including many from the countries bearing the greatest burden of the epidemic. Signatories are of MD, PhD level or equivalent, although scientists working for commercial companies were asked not to sign."
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v406/n6791/full/406015a0.html
Posted by: MacDonald | June 08, 2008 at 09:15 AM
Don't forget Nature having the decency to publish a rebuttal of the Durban Declaration.
http://molbio.med.miami.edu/HIV-Aids/AIDSNews/durbanrebuttalinNature.pdf
Posted by: Winthorpe | June 08, 2008 at 11:21 PM