Es ist schon tolldreist. Zuerst Leute massenweise umbringen, dann schreien "Haltet die Mörder!". Freilich, Herrn Wainberg dürfte das Wasser bis zum Hals stehen. Offenbar ein verzweifelter Befreiungsschlag!
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ANDRÉ PICARD
Public Health Reporter
Monday, May 1, 2000
Globe and Mail (Canada's National Newspaper)
Montreal -- Those who contend that HIV does not cause AIDS are criminally
irresponsible and should be jailed for the menace they pose to public
health, one of the world's top researchers says.
Dr. Mark Wainberg, president of the International AIDS Society, said
yesterday there is little doubt that the statements of HIV deniers have
caused "countless" individuals to contract the deadly immunodeficiency virus.
"People have died as a consequence of the Peter Duesbergs of this world,"
he said, singling out the guru of the fringe movement. Dr. Duesberg, a
biochemist at the University of California at Berkeley, argues that HIV is
harmless and that AIDS is caused by drugs, including those used to treat
HIV. What angers public-health advocates most is the dissident's view that
condoms and safe sex are "irrelevant."
Dr. Wainberg said he believes in free speech, but limits to free speech are
justified when it grossly undermines public-health efforts.
"If we could succeed and lock a couple of these guys up, I guarantee you
the HIV-denier movement would die pretty darn quickly," he said in a fiery
speech at the closing of the annual conference of the Canadian Association
for HIV Research, being held in Montreal.
Dr. Wainberg, a renowned researcher who has become an activist in his role
as head of the largest international AIDS body, has in the past dismissed
HIV deniers as "crazy kooks who should be ignored the same way we should
ignore Holocaust deniers." But, lately, he has mounted a public rhetorical
crusade.
There are two reasons for the change of heart. Domestically, the McGill
University researcher has been angered by publication of The Virus Within,
a book by journalist Nicholas Regush that argues AIDS is caused by herpes
virus 6, not by HIV.
Internationally, Dr. Wainberg is troubled by the fact that the President of
South Africa, one of the countries hit hardest by HIV-AIDS, has publicly
endorsed the views of Dr. Duesberg.
President Thabo Mbeki has lashed out at those refusing to debate the cause
of AIDS for waging a "campaign of intellectual intimidation and terrorism"
and has likened their intransigence to the "racist apartheid tyranny we
opposed."
Dr. Wainberg disagrees, saying that to even debate the question "Does HIV
cause AIDS?" leads to irresponsible sexual behaviour and prompts those
undergoing treatment to abandon their medications.
He told delegates that, in other matters of public health, such as smoking,
the debate would not be tolerated.
Ein charmantes Kerlchen, nicht wahr?