I have had the chance during the past few days to read up on your government’s decision to install an international expert commission in order to examine various aspects of the Aids issue.
I am deeply troubled (like so many others) about the direction this commission is taking. Clearly, if one looks at the guidance points that went out to those invited to join this commission, the prime objective is not to do with how to allocate health care resources in South Africa in an ethical manner, how to undertake prevention campaigns, and so on, but rather whether HIV causes Aids or not.
I have belonged to the dissident group that questions whether HIV is the cause of Aids for a number of years myself, and they still list me as one of the academics demanding a reappraisal of the HIV/Aids hypothesis.
I am no longer a member of this group and I am deeply disturbed that at this point in time anyone would wish to give these views a prominent airing or even (yet another) serious evaluation.
Many of the people who signed the petition the group is holding up as evidence of widespread support for its views did so many many years ago, when the level of knowledge we had about HIV and Aids was quite different to our current knowledge.
The fact of the matter is: nobody knows how many of those who signed this list many years ago would still sign it today (I for one would not).
So, this clearly throws some doubt on the claims the group makes with regard to the supposed widespread support for its views.
It’s also worth having a closer look at who “the group” is. Essentially it’s a rag-tag band of dissidents who all have their own pet theories about what causes Aids – right-wing religious fundamentalists like the idea that it’s a promiscuous lifestyle; then we have scientists in the group holding the view that retroviruses (such as HIV) cannot cause any disease at all; while others dispute that retroviruses exist at all, and so on and so forth. What unites them is that for various reasons they must claim that HIV is not causing Aids, because then their related pet theories would turn out to be wrong.
The debate South Africa is going to have as a consequence of the decision to frame the points of reference in the way they were framed is a debate we had in Western countries roughly 10 years ago.
This debate quite rightly is dead and buried, largely because of tremendous gains we have made with regard to successful Aids treatments. These treatments were developed on the basis of the HIV-causes-Aids hypothesis.
Now, it is, of course theoretically still possible that HIV is not causing Aids, but the odds in favour of this view are remoter than remote.
What is worrying is not only the waste of public funds (that should be used for the provision of health care to those in need, and people with HIV are just one group of people who could benefit from this) that comes with this international expert commission, but also and probably more importantly, this expert commission will comprise “experts” claiming that HIV is not causing Aids, and that Aids is actually not even an infectious disease.
Given that the brief of this commission is to reach a consensus on this matter (which it cannot), we will likely see statements and counter-statements after its work has concluded, claiming that Aids is non-infectious, and that a positive HIV test is meaningless.
What this could mean for HIV-prevention campaigns – that is, vital public health campaigns -in a country such as South Africa is obvious.
On a theoretical level the debate itself is plain stupid, and it only has survived because people have no decent understanding of the epistemological status of the various claims and counter- claims. Just one example: Professor Peter Duesberg claims that HIV is not causing Aids. He does so because he thinks that no one has demonstrated how HIV causes illness. It should be obvious that even if this were true (that there is only a correlation but no proof of causation) it wouldn’t follow that therefore HIV is not causing Aids. At best he could claim that it isn’t proven that HIV causes Aids. This is a far cry from saying HIV is not the cause of Aids.
Naturally if this senior Berkeley-based scientist isn’t even able to get such basic means of analysis and argument right, one must question his overall credibility as a serious scientist trying to advance debate on this matter.
I think President Thabo Mbeki’s view that open debate is useful and a good thing is unquestionable, but what should, and indeed must, be questioned is the use of public funds to allow a small minority of academics and activists to air sectarian and discredited views in South Africa a decade after the debate on this issue has concluded in Western countries. No new evidence has emerged that would justify to have this debate all over again.
This was submitted by a scientist who prefers to stay anonymous