>
> Chris, I personally believe that HIV causes AIDS (based on various studies
ok...
> - e.g. the experience in Zambia - where the spread of HIV/AIDS did not
> match poverty statistics - is a pretty good counter-argument to the AIDS =
> poverty argument),
well, "my" theory is not that AIDS equals poverty. obviously, one cannot explain AIDS among not-poor gay men in the u.s., for example, by reducing AIDS to a function of poverty. poverty, iatrogenesis, and and lab practices, i think, must be taken into account if one is to develop any comprehensive dissident theory on AIDS.
but I doubt we'll resolve the argument on
> LBO-talk.
no doubt.
Differences of this magnitude are seldom amenable to debate.
>
yes, true...
> A whole lot of people in South Africa (including the Pan Africanist
> Congress's spokesperson on Health issues, a doctor named Costa Gazi) have
> taken a rather careful look at the AIDS issue.
i don't doubt that they have...
The situation in South
> Africa - where members of the government have access to anti-retrovirals,
> while the same ANC government denies such access to poor, black majority -
> forces a close inspection of this topic.
yes, it does. but i think there is a degree of "if the well-off are hording something, then it must be a good thing to have" at work here. AIDS-regimen drugs are very toxic. so toxic that most people who take them have a hard time using them consistently (that is still the case despite the fact that this latest round of drugs is considerably less toxic than previous regimens). there are a few excellent studies that show that so-called HIV positive folks respond much, much better to nutritional strategies--diets emphasizing lots of fresh fruits and vegetables, good fats, heavy supplemation of anti-oxidants, especially vitamin c, vitamin e, beta-carotene, etc--than prescribed drugs. yet i have heard nobody shouting about access to excellent, fresh food, vitamin c powder and high-quality multi-vitamins.
The consensus amongst HIV/AIDS
> activists is:
>
> * anti-retrovirals are shown to lower the risk of mother to child
> transmission of HIV. Thus they should be provided by the government.
of course, there are a growing number of medical scientist who are questioning the very notion of retro-virals, any debate about AIDS aside...
>
> * various rich people in South Africa (most famously Judge Edwin
> Cameron) can afford drug cocktail treatments and seem to be doing well
> with them. Poor people should also be given this option.
see above...
> * various medicines to treat opportunistic infections which AIDS suffers
> suffer from should be acquired cheaply, however possible (e.g. via deals
> with pharmacos, or via compulsory licensing) and provided. *NOTE:* even if
> you don't believe HIV causes AIDS, you should support this. Yet Mbeki, and
> the health minister, Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, oppose this, and an ANC
> spokesperson compared the illegal import of a generic equivalent of the
> drug fluconazole to 'apartheid era biological warfare'.
again, this only makes sense if you believe that people are suffering from AIDS. also, "black" folk both here and in africa have every reason to be suspicious of ANY drug coming out of ANY pharmaceutical company. the pharmceutical companies are in the business of making money, not making people healthier. the language employed by msimang (and i am no fan of mbeki's politics) may have been a little over the top but that said, the world would be a much better place if folks heeded or gave studied consideration to "black paranoia" more frequently (i know you did not call it that but that's was the subtle message behind the media assault on mbeki earlier this year). giving people drugs for a non-existent virus from profit-hungry pharmaceutical companies that market their "product" with deceptive ads, and that even in some cases, have unhealthy relationships with notorious intelligence agencies...well, you make the call...of course, we are disagreeing over the existance of the viru! s itself so...
> * an honest debate on HIV/AIDS is necessary. This is not possible when the
> ANC accusses COSATU (the union federation) of being 'infiltrated by TAC'
> when it criticises Mbeki.
>
yes, certainly...
> Mbeki's position is, almost certainly, the result of a combination of
> single-minded promotion of the GEAR macro-economic policy (a kind of
> self-imposed SAP designed along with researchers from the World Bank and
> (white Afrikaner dominated) Stellenbosch university) and an authoritarian
> disregard for suffering.
again, i am no mbeki fan but i really don't see this. you'll have to elaborate.
>
> In the end, the debate on HIV and AIDS has been deployed as a delaying
> tactic in South Africa.
in what sense?
And anyway, whatever you believe on the debate,
> the actions of the SA government are unjustifiable (in this sphere, as in
> so many others, such as housing, services, etc.). Mbeki deserves to be
> locked up along with all the other agents of capitalism (both Apartheid
> and post-Apartheid style).
>
well, the situation in mbeki's s.a. is surely shitty but let's not condemn his opinion on AIDS simply by association with his other shitty policies.
chris niles
> --
> Peter van Heusden <pvh at egenetics.com>
> NOTE: I do not speak for my employer, Electric Genetics
> "Criticism has torn up the imaginary flowers from the chain not so that man
> shall wear the unadorned, bleak chain but so that he will shake off the chain
> and pluck the living flower." - Karl Marx, 1844
> OpenPGP: 1024D/0517502B : DE5B 6EAA 28AC 57F7 58EF 9295 6A26 6A92 0517 502B
>
>