[Dean's World] Aziz P: an experiment for Duesberg

[notify at powerblogs.com]

Posted by Aziz P:
an experiment for Duesberg
http://www.deanesmay.com/posts/1151422532.shtml


   Well, at least one person understood the spirit in which I made my
   earlier chalenges, and has responded in good faith. Dale writes in:

     I believe that the best available evidence says HIV causes AIDS but
     if I were looking to test Duesberg's hypothesis, this is what I
     would do.

     First, since any test of a hypothesis has to take into account what
     is already known about a problem I think it is important to take
     into account that virtually all individuals who develop an
     AIDS-like syndrome are seropositive for HIV. At least in the US
     this appears to be true. Duesberg himself acknowledged that in his
     1987 paper.

     Seropositivity for HIV upon further testing expands to include
     evidence not only of antibodies against so called HIV specific
     proteins, but the proteins themselves (like p24 and reverse
     transcriptase), DNA sequences and RNA sequences.

     Therefore, HIV must either be an infectiously acquired virus or an
     endogenous retrovirus or some other combination of endogenous genes
     that are activated in patients with AIDS. In other words, an effect
     of whatever the undiscovered cause is.

     If you accept that as a premise then a test for whether drugs cause
     AIDS could become a test for whether drugs can activate the set of
     endogenous genes called HIV.

     So step one would be to demonstrate that those genes are endogenous
     which I would do by contacting MACS which is a long term study of a
     large group of homosexuals. These men have been followed for years
     and according to google, as of 2003, there were over 200
     seroconverters in the group. I would get blood from as many of them
     as possible at their time of entry into the study. I would exclude
     any who seroconverted within a year of entry and the rest I would
     isolate DNA and look for evidence of HIV sequences. The presence of
     HIV sequences in all, or at least most of my study sample would
     argue that HIV (whatever it is) is indeed endogenous.

     Then I would PCR amplify the relevant DNA sequences from these
     individuals (maybe three or four of them) put them into the
     chromosomal DNA of human cells and introduce those cells into mice
     with no immune system. i.e. a SCID-hu mouse. Treat the mice with
     the drug of your choice, show the endogenous genes can be activated
     and reproduce whatever aspects of AIDS can be reproduced in SCID-
     hu mice.

     Positive results would both support Duesberg's model and explain
     much of the other data out there. HIV activation would be a
     consequence rather than a cause of AIDS although it might still
     contribute to the pathogenesis.

   Now, I invite all HIV skeptics and traditionalists alike to critique
   the experiment, refine it, improve upon it, identify what it does tell
   us and what it doesnt tell us, and utimately bring it closer to
   something that we could (theoretically... and maybe not so
   theoretically) put in a grant proposal.