The mystery of HIV/AIDS.(Letter to the editor)

SIR: Congratulations to Henry Bauer (July-August 2006) for daring to attack the accepted wisdom on HIV/AIDS. I would just like to add a couple of non-technical points.

In 1984, American virologist Robert Gallo announced his discovery that a virus, HIV, was the agent that caused the immune system's breakdown--defined as AIDS. Partly because of the perceived extent of the health emergency and partly the desire to snatch credit from the Frenchman, Montagnier, working on the same theory, those who later opposed Gallo's theory claimed that no time was given to assess his work. As a result, Gallo's hypothesis was immediately accepted as immutable truth and almost overnight the rush for a cure for HIV produced a vast agglomeration of economic and political interests.

Dr Peter Duesberg, professor of Molecular Biology at the University of California Berkeley in 1987, was the first major critic. But by then the theory had become axiomatic, and the research community, its funding and prestige were totally committed to it. Duesberg was ridiculed and lost virtually all his funding--a cautionary tale for others.

The pharmaceutical companies ("an industry of awesome, relentless, amoral power" as one dissident described them) were and are key players. Along with governments, health and charitable organisations they are big business. Prestige and politics enter the equation. The financial implications of legal battles should the HIV/AIDS theory prove incorrect are mind-blowing, along with huge embarrassments. Everybody with a stake in the original hypothesis is naturally suspicious and defensive of a challenge.

The dissidents, including the Perth ...