Science Fictions: A Scientific Mystery, a Massive Cover-up and the Dark Legacy of Robert Gallo

October 2008: A quarter-century after the discovery of HIV and the invention of the HIV blood test at the Pasteur Institut in Paris, the Nobel Prize in Medicine was awarded to Pasteur researchers Francoise Barre and Luc Montagnier. Not included in that award was Robert Gallo, who for many of those 25 years had attempted to claim credit as the discoverer, and later the co-discoverer, of HIV. With that verdict, science at last accepted what the evidence had long shown, that the fundamental discoveries leading to the recognition of HIV as the cause of AIDS had occurred in France, and not in Gallo’s laboratory at the U.S. National Cancer Institute. One of the most divisive and destructive disputes in modern scientific history had at last been laid to rest. — John Crewdson  order the book now

HIV Criminalization Compounded by Confusion Over Validity of HIV Test

By Karen Ocamb News Editor www.frontiersla.com
(Editor’s note: Sec. Hillary Clinton, who has personally known people who have died from AIDS—she spoke at her friend Bob Hattoy’s memorial, for instance—told the International AIDS Conference on Monday: “If we’re going to beat AIDS, we can’t afford to avoid sensitive conversations, and we can’t afford not to reach the people who are at the highest risk.” Getting tested to know one’s status to get help and not pass on the disease has been a health care mantra for years. But some HIV/AIDS activists are now prompting “sensitive conversations” about the quietly increasing criminalization of HIV. 

POZ founder Sean Strub (“Take the Test and Risk Arrest?”)  and longtime HIV/AIDS journalist Todd Heywood, in particular, have been sounding the alarm. But now freelance journalist Terry Michael—a self-described “independent Washington journalist, who directs the Washington Center for Politics & Journalism, and who has covered the HIV-AIDS story at his personal web site,where he raises questions about HIV-AIDS theory”—raises some even more troubling questions about how the validity of HIV tests themselves are being questioned in courtrooms. In early July, Michael emailed me that he had covered two cases of “HIV Panic” in military courts. Here is Michael’s report (as sent) that may raise even more questions for “sensitive conversations” no one’s having. – Karen Ocamb)

Army acquits heterosexual soldier, convicts gay officer in ‘HIV panic’ cases, increasingly questioned by HIV-positive advocates

by Terry Michael

Just six weeks after an Army judge at Ft. Bragg, North Carolina, acquitted a heterosexual soldier in a so-called “HIV panic” case, another military judge at Ft. Belvoir in Virginia found a gay Army officer guilty on all counts for not revealing his HIV status and engaging in unprotected sex.

Imprisoned for transmitting HIV: One man's story

By Saundra Young, CNN Sr. Medical Producer

 A good discussion, from a mainstream perspective, about how the HIV=AIDS dogma criminalized HIV antibodies and how it is very hard to escape if you refuse to escape the dogma. from http://aras.ab.ca/news.html

(CNN) -- The nightmare Nick Rhoades has been living the past four years began after a one-time sexual encounter with another Iowa man, Adam Plendl.

It was June 2008. The 34-year-old Rhoades, who is HIV positive, says he was on antiretroviral medications. His viral load -- the amount of virus in his blood -- at the time was undetectable and he says he wore a condom. But Plendl contacted the police because Rhoades did not disclose his HIV status.

HIV IS NOT A CRIME, 2011 Film by Sean Strub

Should hiding HIV status always be a crime?

by Lauren Vogel Canadian Medical Association 

Canadians living with HIV should not face jail time for keeping their medical condition from sexual partners if the risk of transmission is low or if they use condoms while having sex, civil liberties advocates say.

Criminal prosecution should be reserved for those who intentionally infect others, they add while asking the Supreme Court of Canada to define the meaning of “significant risk of harm” and compel its use as a standard in determining whether to prosecute people (using Criminal Code provisions such as aggravated sexual assault) who fail to disclose their HIV-positive status to sexual partners.

Detroit Man Alleges HIV Discrimination By Lysol-Spraying Dental Clinic Coworkers

by Todd Heywood - poz.com

Local attorneys in Detroit are preparing to sue the national, privately-owned Great Expressions Dental Centers for what they say is the worst case of alleged HIV-related job discrimination they have ever handled. And while the company denied any wrong doing, the Detroit office of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) agreed with James White and his attorneys that there was reasonable cause to believe the dental company with clinics in Michigan, Ohio, Florida, Georgia, Connecticut, Virginia and Massachusetts had unlawfully discriminated against White. In a letter from the Commission, White was informed:

Schools bar students with HIV

by Bich Huong

"Living without discrimination" reads one of the signs
carried by students from Yen Bai Secondary School and
the Ba Vi Centre for Social Education and Labour at the
Colourful Rainbowl camp this month.
— Photo courtesy Save the Children Viet Nam

HA NOI — As the new school year begins, some 40 youngsters with HIV at the Centre for Social Education and Labour No 2 in Ba Vi, on the outskirts of Ha Noi, still long for the day when they can join mainstream education.

Quach Thi Mai, principal of Yen Bai B Primary School, said a lack of understanding about the disease had led to a great deal of prejudice and a reluctance among parents to let their children study alongside those with HIV.

Mai said five children from the centre were allowed to attend 1st grade at her school four years ago but that they were forced to leave after a few days because of protests by parents of other schoolchildren.