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Reddit mentions of The River: A Journey to the Source of HIV and AIDS

Sentiment score: 2
Reddit mentions: 4

We found 4 Reddit mentions of The River: A Journey to the Source of HIV and AIDS. Here are the top ones.

The River: A Journey to the Source of HIV and AIDS
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Found 4 comments on The River: A Journey to the Source of HIV and AIDS:

u/axolotl_peyotl · 3 pointsr/conspiracy

Since most historians agree that AIDS originated in Africa, how could it be linked to the polio vaccine if Salk and Sabin's trials were conducted in the U.S., the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe?

>In March 1951, several years before Drs. Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin would scuffle over whose vaccine was the true prophylactic, Dr. Hilary Koprowski announced at a medical conference that he had become the first doctor in history to test polio vaccine on humans. His “volunteers” included several institutionalized children with mental handicaps. They drank the vaccine in chocolate milk.

>From 1957 to 1960, after years of tinkering with monkey kidneys and polio germs, Koprowski tested his own experimental polio vaccine on 325,000 equatorial Africans, including 75,000 citizens of Leopoldville, Belgian Congo (now Kinshasa, Zaire).

>Called by drums, rural natives traveled to local villages where they had a liquid vaccines squirted into their mouths. 98% of the vaccine recipients were infants and toddlers. The youngest children received 15 times the adult dosage. Though Koprowski claimed he had the backing of the World Health Organization, WHO denied sanctioning the large-scale trials.

In 1959, Albert Sabin published a study that claimed that Koprowski's polio vaccine used in the African trials contained un “unidentified” and “unstable” cell-killing virus. Although he was quick to point out the flaws in the vaccine of Koprowski, his professional rival, unfortunately his ability to detect viruses in the polio vaccine fell short when it came to mass contamination of Sabin's own polio vaccine with SV-40.

In response to Sabin's claims of contamination, Koprowski simply scoffed at him and said he was just trying to discredit his work (as he would do again and again to anyone making this accusation). The virus allegedly detected by Sabin was never identified.

Until recently, the earliest known blood sample containing antibodies against HIV was traced back to 1959. The serum came from a patient visiting a clinic in Leopoldville, one of the epicenters of the AIDS epidemic that would occur a decade later.


>Gerald Myers, a genetic sequencing expert with Los Alamos National Laboratories in New Mexico, tracked the evolution of HIV and confirmed that today's major subtypes of the AIDS virus in humans appear to have arisen as recently as 1960.

>Although this time period is widely accepted by medical researchers, more recent conflicting reports suggest that the first HIV infection may have occurred years earlier.

Regardless of when the first HIV infection occurred, it would seem to be premature to dismiss the OPV (Oral Polio Vaccine) AIDS hypothesis on this basis alone. The timing of the first HIV infection is irrelevant to the question of whether or not some doses of the experimental polio vaccine used in Africa in the late 1950s were contaminated, thus precipitating a future outbreak.

>Koprowski's vaccine was not approved for human use, so it was discontinued in 1960 following the African trials. Thus, it was only administered to inhabitants of the Belgian Congo, Rwanda and Burundi—the precise area where high levels of HIV infection were identified by researcher 30 years later.

>Furthermore, the AIDS virus is known to infect mucous cells, prevalent in the mouth. The African vaccines were squirted into people's mouths.

>Could squirting an HIV-contaminated polio vaccine into people's mouths cause AIDS? According to Tom Folks, chief retrovirologist at the CDC, “Any time a person has a lesion in his mouth, then there could be transmission” of the virus.

Dr. Robert Bohannon of Baylor College of Medicine asserts that squiring polio vaccines into one's mouth would tend to aerosolize some of the liquid. Small drops could then go into the lungs, and from there to the blood cells susceptible to infection. This could be an efficient mode of HIV transmission.

Experts believe that the average time between HIV infection and the development of AIDS is approximately 8-10 years.

>If the African polio vaccine was indeed contaminated with SIV/HIV, initial outbreaks of AIDS would have occurred from the mid-1960s to early 1970s. This period accurately coincides with the emergence of AIDS in equatorial Africa.

Understandably, authorities are very reluctant to admit that there's even a possibility that scientists may have contributed to the AIDS pandemic by growing polio vaccines in virus-laden monkey kidneys.

In 1992, Tom Curtis published a story for Rolling Stone that created quite a stir.

Although dismissed by most experts, “a few scientists, notably the biologist W.D. Hamilton, thought the hypothesis required serious investigation, but they received little support from the scientific community.”

William Haseltine, a professor at Harvard, believes that hypothesizing about the origin of AIDS is distracting and nonproductive, saying, “It's not relevant...I'm not interested in discussing it.” Dr. David Heymann, head of the WHO's Global Program of AIDS, stated that “the origin of the AIDS virus is of no importance to science today.”

Jonas Salk wouldn't comment on the possibility, as apparently he was too busy working on an AIDS vaccine, and Sabin's response was “you can't hang Koprowski with that.” Koprowski himself initially dismissed the idea with a laugh, and then later said that “this is a highly theoretical situation.”

His amusement must not have lasted long, because Koprowski sued Curtis and Rolling Stone for “...the destruction of (his) professional and personal reputation, for mental and emotional suffering, and for...humiliation and embarrassment.” As a result the magazine was ordered to pay $1 in damages. [See The Seeds of Doom by Christian Biasco]

However, both Tom Folks of the CDC and Robert Gallo thought testing the seed stocks of polio might be a good idea. According to Folks, “any time we can learn more about the natural history [of AIDS], it helps us understand the pathogenesis and...the transmission.”

Gallo believes that questions like this “are of more than academic interest because answering them may help avoid future zoonitic catastrophes—that is, transmission of disease from lower animals to humans.”

>Responding to these concerns, some AIDS researchers formally requested samples of the original polio vaccine seed stocks. But the government would neither release nor test them because there are “only a small number of vials” of the material, and tests “might use it all up.”

Inspired by Curtis' investigative report, a British writer named Edward Hooper traveled in Africa, Europe, and the United States for seven years. As a result of his research, he published a book in 1999 called The River: A Journey to the Source of HIV and AIDS.

Although the scientific community generally rejects the OPV AIDS hypothesis, Hooper “criticizes the research and conduct of many of the scientists involved in the investigation and alleges a 'very substantial cover-up' took place to silence the hypothesis.”

One of the several arguments against the hypothesis was that Koprowski was not using chimpanzees in his experiments, and therefore HIV contamination didn't occur. However, eyewitness testimony suggests otherwise.

>In 2004, The Origins of AIDS, a French TV documentary strongly supportive of the OPV hypothesis, appeared on several television stations around the world.

The film offers a convincing case for the hypothesis, and seriously challenges the questionable nature of the categorical denials by Koprowski and others that no chimpanzees were used in the development of his experimental vaccine.

u/magnetoelectric · 2 pointsr/conspiracy

I remember when I first saw this documentary years ago on cable (It was either IFC or Sundance) One of the most interesting and profound docs I've ever seen across all subject matters.
It's all based on Ed Hoopers book The River

u/throwaway_hiv · 2 pointsr/explainlikeimfive

A Polish American scientist working on the oral polio vaccine in present day Angola after World War II used Rhesus Monkies despite being told not to. Rhesus Monkies have Simian Immunodeficiency Virus (SIV). He inoculated a million Angolans with this vaccine. The scientist later denied using Rhesus Monkies though his head lab technician confirmed it.

Short version
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUbfzOZLMjQ

Long version
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oitjxuQMWCY

THE BOOK http://www.amazon.com/The-River-Journey-Source-AIDS/dp/0316371378/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1361668397&sr=8-1&keywords=the+river+edward+hooper

u/conspirobot · 1 pointr/conspiro

axolotl_peyotl: ^^original ^^reddit ^^link

From The Health Century by Edward Shorter: "Her treatment became a scandal within the scientific community."

Apparently it also later became the subject of a congressional inquiry, but I haven't had the chance to confirm that.

The Virus and the Vaccine is great, but it really should be read with Dr. Mary's Monkey by Edward Haslam and Me and Lee by Judyth Vary Baker.

The three of these together paint an incredible picture of one of the craziest stories of the 20th century.

I've heard The River is great too but I haven't read it.