It's About Bloody Time! Nature: SF DPH Expert Says UNAIDS "Overestimates" HIV

Almost on cue, this week's Nature has published some words that begin to make sense about the "epidemic of AIDS" in Africa. Coming on the heels of the JAMA/Lancet backsliding on HAART's efficacy and the usefullness of viral load measurements in deciding the appropriate time and type of clinical intervention, middle and low level AIDS, Inc. spin doctors, who have been kept extra busy the past weeks, will have even more spinning to do. It has already started, as is clear from the internal bandages in the article itself (reprinted below).

Michael Peterelis, who first brought our attention to the publication, has an excellent report of this item in which he places it in the context of previous public admissions of gross error in estimates.

Nature
Published online: 30 October 2006;
New methods suggest AIDS toll lower than estimated
By Erika Check

There is no doubt that the number of HIV infections worldwide is still on the rise: the toll is up to 40 million, according to UNAIDS. But are scientists using the right method to count the cases?

This year's UNAIDS estimates of the epidemic are lower than those released at the end of last year for 11 southern African countries and for China. And in August, Indian epidemiologists cast doubt on their country's high estimate of HIV cases. [...]

Based on sentinel surveillance, UNAIDS estimates that India has 5.7 million HIV-infected individuals—slightly more than the government estimate of 5.2 million—earning India the unhappy distinction of being the country with the most HIV infections.

But when researchers led by Lalit Dandona, an epidemiologist at the Administrative Staff College of India, ran a population-based survey, their data suggested that the real number could be as low as 3.5 million.

Dandona's group gave HIV tests to as many people as would consent to the study in one district of Andhra Pradesh state. Based on their estimate, only 47,000 people in the district are HIV-positive, less than half of the official estimate of 113,000 people. The team then calculated an adjustment factor for this bias from their data, then applied it to data from other states, arriving at their substantially lower number for the country.

"We were very surprised," says Dandona. "Before we released this to the public, we spent a lot of time making sure we were not underestimating."

Other epidemiologists say that they're not surprised the official estimates are off.

"Many of us in the field have suspected that the standard methods of estimation have resulted in overestimates," says Willi McFarland, director of HIV/AIDS Statistics and Epidemiology for the San Francisco Department of Public Health.

Sentinel surveys are great for tracking trends—to pinpoint sites where infections are rising, for instance—but they're not ideal for predicting absolute numbers, he says.

One explanation for India's overestimate may be that the poor are more likely to be infected than are the wealthy, and a higher proportion of the poor go to public clinics.

Officials are still mulling over the implications of the study. UNAIDS expert Peter Ghys says population-based surveys in other states indicate that the birth clinic HIV rates accurately reflect HIV infections in the general population.

India's National AIDS Control Organisation adds that it is reviewing the methods but is not likely to conduct large population-based surveys because they are too expensive.

Comments

[HankBarnes]

Otis,

This is a great piece and you are doing a great job.

The AIDS bunglers have been bungling the number of AIDS cases for years. Nature's a bit late to the party -- so to speak -- but I reckon, better late, than never.

Hank

[Dan]

Hank and Otis,
I'm glad that you're seeing optimism...although it's a razor-thin sliver of optimism, in my opinion.

What's disturbing to me is: Dandona's group gave HIV tests to as many people as would consent to the study in one district of Andhra Pradesh state. How many of these people are now condemned by the "AIDS" inquisition? How many of them are feeling incredible hopelessness due to the belief that they harbor a microbe that is killing them?

Another disturbing quote of the article: One explanation for India's overestimate may be that the poor are more likely to be infected than are the wealthy... WHY?! What makes the poor more susceptible to "infection"?

[Otis]

Dan,

Hold your horses there fella. Speak if you must for Hank, not for me, but I think I can speak for both of us when I write that you are seeing "razor-thin optimism" where I certainly have never placed any.

I am certain, however, that the last months (beginning with the Harper's article) have witnessed a real and decisive shift in the wind and momentum, and that "we" are no longer on the defensive. Quite the contrary, it is the board of directors of AIDS, Inc., who for the first time since Pres. Mbeki stood up, are nervous.

I do not regard this as an optimistic assessment, just a factual one.

Optimism would imply that I have some actual hope that the clear increase in public awareness of how it has been hoodwinked all these years and years will translate into AIDS, Inc. going the way of Enron as some have suggested. I have no such hope, any more than I was optimistic that after Watergate Wasington politics would really change.

Hank,

It is very nice to see that you feel moved to tell all our thousands of readers what a good job I am doing. However, I have checked my mailbox all day for an email containing news of my raise.

You try living in Southern California, or anywhere else almost, on what you pay me, rich Berkeley hills lawyer man with the write your own "complementary checking" account.

[HankBarnes]

Dan,

I see optimism. These jerks have taken some good body shots -- and, like most bullies or paper tigers, ain't used to it.

I say more please. And faster.

Otis,

My man! I'm fixin' to give you a fat raise any day now!

[Dan]

Sorry, Otis. I read into some optimism that obviously wasn't there.

I agree that the Harper's article really created some waves, and has taken us off the defensive. And with Hank's worthy efforts, he's taken Padian out of the dark shadows and into the light...where she's on the defensive.

I have optimism. I've been actively participating in this debate for several years. It's still very frustrating, but the hopelessness I used to feel is definitely abating.

[Gene Semon]

“Mathematical models … reveal a pattern where the number of cases of HIV infection (and thence of AIDS) increase faster as time goes on IN COMPOUND INTEREST FASHION*, the models have an important role to play in convincing governments and international aid agencies of the wisdom of acting now, not later”. (R Anderson and R May, Understanding The AIDS Pandemic, Scientific American, May 1992, 58) *(emphasis added)

Here’s another important point to emphasize in the continuing offensive: the models are based on computer-generated hot air since they have not been validated by transmission-incidence data. This GIGO point is reinforced by the Duesberg/Bialy default – based on the properties of retroviruses – flat curve approximation that debunks “compound interest” transmission.

The “experts” described above are now deploying classical fudge factoring in a desperate attempt to make the numbers appear more “realistic”. The “Uganda fiasco” where population increase belies the original prediction, is officially down the memory hole.

GIGO is also confirmed by the following from Heinrich Kremer:

“Dr. Gallo misinterpreted the protein released after oxidizing stimulation from the immune cells of AIDS patients that were cultivated jointly with human leukemia cells. He identified it as "HIV" protein. Using this human cell protein, Dr. Gallo equipped the test substrate for his patented "anti-HIV" antibody test. This test substrate, which had been adjusted to especially high antibody amounts, reacted with antibodies in blood serum of people whose immune cells form a particularly high level of antibodies. This is true above all for people whose immune cells no longer produce NO resistance gas but increasingly stimulate synthesis of antibodies instead. A "HIV"-positive test result means nothing else than that the test person has particularly high amounts of antibodies in the blood, and these react accordingly with foreign human test protein. Since there are no antibodies in human blood that react only with protein against which they were originally formed, the "HIV" test demonstrably reacts to many different antibodies. In Africa, antibodies in the blood serum of test subjects react positively in the HIV test, though the antibodies formed originally against antigen protein from tuberculosis, malaria, and PCP fungi pathogens as well as many other pathogens.

“Hence there are no 'HIV' infections either by sexual transmission or via the bloodstream. So-called mother-child transmissions are transmissions of maternal antibodies to the child and/or toxic damage to the child’s immature immune-cell formation in the mother’s womb and/or immune-cell anomalies after birth by toxic medication treatment. They can also be the result of the mother having a chronic infection that was transmitted to the child.” (ANSWERS TO THE QUESTIONS OF PRESIDENT MBEKI, By Heinrich Kremer, http://www.virusmyth.net/aids/data/hkmbeki2.htm)

I do not find this inconsistent with "isolation" considering only DNA sequences, here cell cultures model in vivo retrogenetic vectors - evolution speeded up, so to speak.

As we witness the worldwide attention being focused on the Perth Group and their “strong-principle” version of ontological refutation, as summarized by Dr Kremer, consider a campaign by AIDS INC to drive a wedge within the dissidents. I would argue that Peter Duesberg’s 1987 – 1989 papers represent a “weak-principle” version of the same ontological refutation - “inventing the AIDS virus”.

It is precisely the forensic equivalency of these twin debunkings of a novel, singular agent causing a worldwide pandemic that should be understood, IMHO.