It is time, I would agree, to bury this dead horse. When someone offers as evidence that HIV is insignificant the fact that tests for its presence are not commonly and widely used in Africa, and then simply shifts off to another red herring when it is pointed that such tests are costly, and not cost-effective, on a continent which has so little resources to commit to medical care -- so much so, I would add, that there are still major areas where hypodermic needles are reused -- there is little point in offering other arguments. They will be met in the same fashion.
Not only is what Justin says above true, but what is more, the only evidence that I have seen proffered here against the overwhelming consensus of the scientific community is a web site on "virus myths." Sorry, but that doesn't even begin to cut it. One of the first lessons I taught high school students about using the web when I was full-time in the classroom was that anyone can put up anything on the web, and that it is essential to carefully vet the source and reliability of what you find. There are numerous articles that point this out with respect to medical care, and there are various web sites that have been developed to provide scientifically up-to-date and accurate information to the general public. Needless to say, "virus myths" is not one of them.
Frankly, all of this would not be worth any of the time we have spent on it, were it not for that fact that some folks listen to this nonsense, and do a great deal of harm to themselves and others as a result. When "virus myths" tells us that AIDS doesn't exist, and that sexual transmission is a non-reality, why practice safe sex? When it tells you that it is anti-retroviral drugs, and not HIV, which makes you sick, why go through all of the trouble of those pain-in-the-ass drug regimens? My last word: this is on the order of giving cancer patients copper bracelets to cure them.
Leo Casey United Federation of Teachers 260 Park Avenue South New York, New York 10010-7272 (212-598-6869)
Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never has, and it never will. If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation are men who want crops without plowing the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its waters.
-- Frederick Douglass --
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