For the past 20 plus
years, like most other hospital based physicians working inside mainstream
medicine, I accepted the HIV/AIDS hypothesis without question. The idea that HIV infected and killed T cells and therefore wiped out the immune
system causing opportunistic infection was accepted by every one else, so I had
no reason to question it. My major concern was avoiding a needle puncture from
a patient whose HIV status was unknown. In retrospect, I admit I was vaguely
aware of questions, but I didn’t know what those questions were or who posed
them.
A few
months ago, while surfing the internet for news, I came across a Google video
entitled,” HIV/AIDS, Fact or Fraud?”, containing interviews with Dr. Peter
Duesberg and Dr. Charles Thomas. The information seemed credible and sparked my
curiosity, so I ordered the book, “Inventing the Aids Virus“ by Peter Duesberg,
as well as books by Farber, Bialy and Lauritson, and emailed Dr. Duesberg for
more information. He quickly replied with a collection of more recent articles
along with a sample of his appealing sense of humor. After weighing the arguments and style of the proponents of the two sides, I came away impressed with what seemed the higher moral and
ethical standards of the AIDS rethinkers; their obviously much higher, scientific
standards, and their inescapable, common sense credibility.
It was only then that it occurred to me after working inside
multiple hospitals since the beginning of the "epidemic", I did not know of a single co-worker who had contracted AIDS, a
supposedly contagious disease. I do, however, have personal knowledge of co-workers
contracting real infectious diseases such as hepatitis and tuberculosis from
exposure to patients. In addition, as a radiologist, I routinely saw the
admission chest xrays and admitting diagnosis on many patients. There was no
massive epidemic, or even mini one, of sick people carrying the diagnosis of
AIDS.
Which
brings me to the point of my descent, that began after I read the Sept 27 JAMA
2006 article by Rodriguez et al. showing essentially no correlation between CD4 cell count and HIV viral
load - indicating that unchecked virus replication is not killing the CD4 cells. On
the same day, I posted this information at the misc.health.aids newsgroup
and quickly realized that I had entered the proverbial snake pit.
My posted message was almost a direct quote
from the JAMA authors: “The noncorrelation in the Figure 3 (click on the
miniature to the left) scattergram on page 1504 is the finding which indicates
that HIV plasma RNA level (HIV viral load) is not a reliable predictor of CD4
cell loss in HIV infection and challenges the concept that the magnitude of viral
replication is the main determinant of the speed of CD4 cell loss at the
individual level.”
I promptly
received a reply from a Nick Bennett, who turns out to be an MD /PhD from Cambridge (UK), currently a pediatric infectious disease
resident trainee in NY, and a self appointed guardian of the HIV/AIDS hypothesis. He explained to
me in a condescending and extremely arrogant manner that, "No, I am
mistaken, the JAMA article actually confirms a correlation between CD4 cell
count and HIV viral load. There is indeed a linear trend in Figure 3,
because the R-squared Coefficient of Correlation is not zero.”
This
absurdity revealed the lie behind the credentials, as clearly the man knows
nothing about linear regression analysis. The Figure 3 R-squared is actually
0.04, which for statistical purposes is just slightly above zero. R-squared values range from zero to 1.0,
with 1.0 indicating a straight line and zero indicating a random pattern of
dots very much like Figure 3.
Bennett
continued his post by questioning my training and background and ability to
read and interpret the medical literature.
” I find
it astonishing that you somehow think yourself better qualified to analyse
(sic) the results of a paper than the authors themselves or indeed anyone else
with specialist qualifications in the relevant field. Where's your research
background in HIV (or even microbiology in general)? Why should I trust
what you say versus what every microbiologist/epidemiologist/clinician and
researcher I've ever met tells me about how to analyse (sic) a paper and judge
and interpret the evidence? I would say you had no relevant experience
upon which to base your views and are incapable of correctly interpreting
scientific evidence in context !”
I barely controlled myself in reply: “The
JAMA, as you know, Dr. Bennett, is the Journal of the American Medical
Association and is written specifically for the members of that organization. I
have been a member of the American Medical Association and have been reading
JAMA since 1976, which is probably before you were born. I was certainly
reading it when you were still in knickers, my youthful but arrogant
correspondent. I've had thirty years of experience reading and interpreting this journal. How many years have you had? “(I neglected to mention my own publication in 1983).
Bennett must have gone back to read his
math book, because he finally agreed an R squared of 0.04 
nonetheless continues in the same self-important manner, and then, with his new found mastery of
linear regression, calculates his own R-squared value, which does not
appear anywhere in the paper, from the data in the paper's Fig. 1 (click on the
miniature to the right). This turns out to be a much more acceptable
0.9776. It is also in total error. If we assume Bennett's PhD is
not a completely fraudulent document, this is either an
intentional deception designed to fool the few gullible who are persuaded that
this man is some kind of authority, or yet another example of the Orwellian Doublethink characteristic of the AIDS
church. Bennett’s Oct 6 blog posts his deceptive graph with the sham R-squared value of
0.9351. [In the event that the post linked in the line above is deleted "by accident", a PDF of the page as it exists on 22 Oct. 2006
is located here. Otis]
The real explanation for the straight line
shown in this figure is provided by a real mathematician, Darin Brown, in
his discussion of the Rodriguez et al. paper that appeared on YBYL on Oct. 9.
"But the most plausible explanation to
me is that Figure 1 (JAMA Sept 27) is just a mathematical artifact. If
you take a cloud of data points that are essentially random (no correlation)
and you break them into 5 subgroups by magnitude of the predictor variable and
choose the median outcome of the response variable for each subgroup, this will
have the effect of obscuring the lack of correlation. It's the
statistical equivalent of squinting your eyes so you can't see any details
anymore."
Jeffrey Dach M.D. is board certified in interventional radiology and a member of the Board of the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine. He retired from radiology two years ago, and is currently in private practice focusing on bio-identical hormone treatment. He is also a painter who frequently exhibits. (The artwork that graces the top of this post is a self portrait of sorts, Otis.)
"We" have now discovered after performing a bit of Google assisted net-research that Nick Bennett (PhD, MD) is the single best credentialed (non anonymous) spokesperson the Church has ever produced to speak for it on the net.
Deacons who demand that arch-heretics write answers to their drivel, and not a single bishop with the balls to debate any of the dread denialists in a single forum one on one.
Trust you are reading this JPM.
And you too Bennett. If you wish to take on Dr. Dach one on one in a debate here that I will fairly moderate, simply leave a note as PB did in some other thread, and I will see it, or email me at the address linked here.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but for those who are new to what are locally referred to as the BW (blog wars):
The most visible other spokespersons for the vested interest AIDS, Inc (AIDS Church) establishment on the internet -- since this issue has been percolating through cyberspace after Dean Esmay and Doc Bialy opened the floodgates coming up on two years now -- have been:
A pharmaceutical rep who calls herself Pharma Bawd and sometimes Pharma Ditz and assorted spokesperons for "acitvist" organizations in the pockets of pharmaceutical companies.
The credentialed spokespersons are:
Tara Smith, a very young (even younger than me) assistant prof. of epidemiology at the U. of Iowa who runs a potpourri pseudo-science blog at the behest of SEED magazine called "Aetiology". No more need be said regarding her competence to instruct anyone about anything past a third grade level, simply visit her site.
Christopher Noble, a middle aged untenured statistics instructor at some university in the middle of Australia who has no publications of any kind in any peer reviewed journals.
And a bunch of anons:
Daf9/Dale - A total idiot whose pseudos can be easily found by mildly judicious use of one or another search engine.
trrll - I can do no better than reproduce a comment I found from an African brother, I think posting from western Nigeria (perhaps even from Ile-Ife itself) on NAR just a few minutes ago:
"objukwu (mail):
I found a priceless quote up there somewhere by the *doctor* (how's it going *doctor*) who has a name like somthing out of Lord of the Rings, which says, amidst a blizzard of vitriol aimed at Duesberg, that the mathematics of (this) disease, its epidemiology, is (precisely) worked out. (Something to that effect.)
Hey Doc, you been sniffing glue or something?
Can I fix you up with Donna Shalala?
Donna said 100 million (no order of magnitude error there) USA registerd voters would be infected with HIV by the year 2000 -- if they had driver's licences.
Do you know why there was no ice in Siberia? I ask everybody, just in case.
Why does Chris Noble go on and on and on and on like the Everready Bunny about predictions, did you give him meth?
Are you two guys in it together?
How much do you get paid? Did your agent get you the the same deal Chris got. Maybe your getting screwed.
10.23.2006 6:58am"
DT - A vet from Scotland who specializes in Haggis AIDS.
If I have omitted anyone, they or their representatives may write me and I will ammend the rogues gallery.
This thread will now be resealed.
Posted by: Otis | October 23, 2006 at 12:08 PM