A Reader Said:
paul you seem very upbeat about a possible cure for this plague on distant horizon light has started to appear at the end of the tunnel but big pharma will fight tooth and nail to keep it as chronic condition like diabetes 50 billion aids pharma is not going to disappear overnight in meantime natural approaches ie vegetarian diet (yogurt and bread) yoga ayurveda meds homeopathy ,vegetable juicing.siddha massage,refloxolgy ice compressionon organs,castrol oil massage.aroma oils,fastingonce a week, vitamin c iv and ozoneiv not forgetting blood electrification have to be given equal chance on your forum in the time being


I say:

No they don?t.

OK, well they can get an ?equal chance? but they need to play by the same rules. I am what they call ?data driven?- meaning I try to let the data tell me what they tell me. Any approach to treating HIV disease, whether it be ARVs or acupuncture or stem cells or chanting to the giant flying spaghetti monster in sky all get looked at the same way- through the lens of evidence. I do not concern myself with value judgment labels like ?natural? or ?holistic? or ?corporate? or ?traditional? or ?western.? I try to go where the evidence takes me- and damn the torpedoes.

It isn?t that I love, or even like, or even don?t hate pharma. I think there is something fundamentally disgusting about selling health. I feel the same about food, and shelter and really most things. I am against the profit system, against capitalism.

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I am also against anti-science, whether it dresses itself up in anti-establishment costuming or not. Calling something ?natural? means nothing to me- it is simply a value judgment; it doesn?t mean anything. There is nothing more natural than HIV- and it is my mortal enemy. There is also nothing more natural than (2S)-1-[(2S,4R)-2-hydroxy-4-[[(1S,2R)-2-hydroxy-2,3-dihydro-1H-inden-1-yl]carbamoyl]-5-phenyl-pentyl]-4-(pyridin-3-ylmethyl)-N-tert-butyl-piperazine-2-carboxamide ? also known as Crixivan, which helped to save my life.

Non ARVs had, and continue to have, their chance to show what they can do. The world does not lack for people who want to explore and study the properties of plants, vitamins, massage and so on. Do the research, make sure it is well designed, have it peer reviewed, publish or present it, give me a chance to look it over, to ask questions, to examine with a skeptic?s eye- and I am happy to give it equal billing in this, and any other forum.

Just don?t expect that I will be any less skeptical of such approaches than I am about ARV research. It is the same game, and everyone plays by the same rules. The burden of proof is always, always, always on the people who support a hypothesis. If you think that a particular approach works- prove it.

That is all I ask.