The only approved drug for HIV infection is Zidovudine, better known as "AZT" or Retrovir. Patients take AZT because they think it is good for the blood and the immune system. They believe it will kill the virus, and prevent KS, pneumocystis pneumonia, and other opportunistic infections. But, in truth, AZT does none of this.

The reality is that AZT is extremely toxic to the blood. As a result, many patients on long-term AZT require frequent blood transfusions. AZT does not prevent KS and pneumocystis pneumonia, nor does it prevent any of the other deadly opportunistic infections of AIDS. When AZT is combined with other drugs, its toxicity increases.

The doctors' drug bible, the PDR (Physician's Drug Reference), clearly warns: "Therapy with AZT may be associated with hematologic toxicity including granulocytopenia (low white blood count) and severe anemia requiring transfusions. In addition, patients treated with AZT may continue to develop opportunistic infections and other complications of HIV infection."

Why do doctors prescribe AZT? Why would a patient allow himself to be treated with such a toxic drug? The answer is simple: AZT is the only FDA-approved drug for AIDS, and its approval was based on a study that purportedly proved that AZT prolongs life. (Ed Note: This series, excerpted from Queer Blood, was published in 1993). Therefore, physicians treat AIDS with AZT; and patients who refuse to take the drug are often considered difficult, uncooperative, and unwise. When medical complications arise in AZT takers, doctors tend to blame "the virus." When medical problems arise in non-AZT users, physicians blame the patient for not taking AZT.

The dangers of AZT are clearly demonstrated in the case of John Kuivenhoven, a gay man who was treated erroneously for "full-blown" AIDS for six years with AZT and other experimental drugs. The painful side effects of these AIDS drugs shattered his health, forcing him to give up work as he waited to die. Now it has been learned he never had AIDS, nor was he ever tested for HIV until 1992 when it was finally discovered that he was not immunodeficient and HIV-negative.

Kuivenhoven has filed a $2 million lawsuit against Kaiser Permanente, the nation's largest health maintenance organization. His lawyer states that high doses of AZT gave his client a chronic headache, hypertension, and constant pain in his legs (peripheral neuropathy). Physicians frequently blame such AIDS symptoms on "the virus." However, if approved AIDS drugs can cause such devastating side effects in an HIV-negative and non-immunodeficient person, such as Mr. Kuivenhoven, how much do these drugs contribute to the pain and suffering and deaths of HIV-positive AIDS patients?

AIDS is generally considered an "invariably fatal" disease. With or without AZT, the end result is death. At the beginning of the epidemic, AIDS experts predicted that 10% of HIV infected gays would develop full-blown AIDS. Now most researchers believe that 90% of HIV-positive people will eventually die from the disease. There are people who claim that AIDS is not a death sentence and that a "cure" is possible, but most experts deny this possibility. Nevertheless, there are a few long-term survivors who claim to have conquered AIDS.

What determines an AIDS cure? Although a medically-accepted AIDS cure does not exist, it would seem reasonable to accept a "five year cure rate," such as that used for cancer patients. The medical establishment considers any cancer patient living 5 years after diagnosis as "a cancer cure." Even if a patient dies from cancer more than 5 years after diagnosis, the patient is still considered "cured."

In my practice, only one gay (a middle-aged Black man) with full-blown AIDS has remained healthy and survived over 5 years. His disease began with enlarged lymph nodes of the groin which proved to be KS of the type common in Africa. He still has numerous KS skin lesions, and his legs are swollen. Although blood tests show evidence of immunodepression, he feels well and is not disabled in any way. He has never taken AZT or chemotherapy.

Although we have "5-year cancer cures" and AZT, the treatment and prognosis for advanced cancer and AIDS remains abysmal for many patients.

In the 1960s I began my study of the "cancer microbe," which is the infectious agent associated with cancer and other immunologic diseases. The microbe is also the unrecognized infectious "co-factor" necessary for the development of full-blown AIDS. Unfortunately, all aspects of cancer microbe research have been ignored by the medical establishment. The details of a century of cancer microbe research have been recorded in my book, The Cancer Microbe (1990).

The cancer microbe exists in the blood and in the tissue damaged by cancer and AIDS. A knowledge of this microbe and its toxicity is essential in understanding why AIDS and cancer are such devastating diseases. Until this infectious agent is recognized, it is doubtful that medical science will ever achieve an effective treatment for AIDS and cancer.

In my view, the most important scientific discovery of this century has been the identification of the cancer microbe. The cancer microbe is "pleomorphic," meaning that its microscopic appearance can vary, depending on its stage of growth. Researchers have shown that it can resemble viruses and bacteria. The cancer microbe exists in all living things.

The discovery of viruses in human and animal cancer is related to the universal presence of the cancer microbe in all living matter. The inability of scientists to recognize the profound biologic importance of the cancer microbe has led to dangerous animal virus experiments and biowarfare research. The result of all this high tech research has been the production and seeding of mutant "superviruses" which now threaten to infect the entire human race.

Unacknowledged by medical science, the cancer microbe resides in every cell. When a cell is damaged (for whatever reason) the cancer microbe becomes active. The ability of the pleomorphic cancer microbe to pose as a virus, and as a bacterium, defies the laws of microbiology. The pleomorphism of the chameleon-like cancer microbe is the major reason why the microbe has not been "accepted" by the medical establishment.

The cancer microbe has been demonstrated microscopically in immunologic diseases, in cancer, and in AIDS-damaged tissue. The cancer microbe is the infectious agent that causes Kaposi's sarcoma. The microbe has been identified in KS tissue, in the swollen lymph nodes accompanying AIDS, and in AIDS-damaged organs examined at autopsy. Although this research has been published in reputable medical journals, the AIDS establishment ignores it completely.

Various forms of the cancer microbe reside in the blood of healthy and ill individuals. A normal immune system allows the cancer microbe to exist in proper balance within the body. However, in disease states the cancer microbe proliferates. The build-up of these germs in the blood and tissues of diseased patients is responsible for much of the toxicity and disability accompanying cancer and AIDS. The severe anemia of terminally ill patients is largely caused by the destruction of red blood cells by cancer microbes Toxic drugs like AZT intensify this destructive process.

Despite a century of cancer microbe research, scientists still believe that normal blood is "sterile." However, simple observation of the blood by use of a "dark-field" microscope has clearly shown elements of the cancer microbe.

The tiniest particles of the microbe are life forms that are the smallest building blocks of nature. Virginia Livingston MD, who studied the cancer microbe for over 40 years, was convinced that cancer viruses were all related to the omnipresent cancer microbe. Livingston, who died in 1990 at the age of 84, wrote extensively on the microbiology of cancer, and did more to popularize the cancer microbe than any other physician of this century. She suffered greatly for her beliefs, and was persecuted by the medical establishment for her unorthodox cancer treatment methods, which included an "autogenous" vaccine made from the patient's own cancer bacteria.

Her book The Conquest of Cancer (1984) created a furor in the scientific community. An unflattering article on her revolutionary ideas about bacteria in cancer appeared in the Los Angeles Times (April 6, 1984).

For many years Virginia had been my friend and teacher, and I respected her more than any physician I knew. In my published research I had confirmed many of her observations of bacteria in cancer and other immunologic diseases. In the Times article, I defended Virginia's unorthodox view of the infectiousness of cancer.

Livingston's scientific opponents were merciless in their condemnation of her work. The Times asked the ubiquitous Robert Gallo for his opinion of Livingston's career in cancer research. He ranted: "What is going on in this country? This is insanity! She can have her theories and what can I say? I don't know of anything to support it. I can't see any basis and I don't know what to say or what analogy to give you."

That same year Gallo was asked about my discovery of bacteria in KS in an interview conducted by James D'Eramo in the New York Native (September 9, 1984). Gallo responded, "I don't know the cause of Kaposi's sarcoma. My guess is that it must be related to HTLV-3 (HIV) in some way." D'Eramo asked why KS occurred mostly in gay men. Gallo answered, "I don't know. KS confuses me."

Years later in 1991, Gallo was still silent on my published reports on bacteria in KS. In addressing AIDS scientists, he announced he was through searching for a "mystery co-factor" in KS. "I want to tell you that we have looked for 7 years, and we haven't found any other virus or microbe. That doesn't mean it is not there, it means neither we nor anyone else has yet found the missing link."

Aspects of cancer microbe research are relevant to the current research of Luc Montagnier, the discoverer of the AIDS virus. Montagnier announced at the Sixth International AIDS Conference that he was studying a tiny microbe called a "mycoplasma" that he had found in AIDS. Mycoplasmas are infectious agents that are part virus and part bacteria. (Back in the 1950s and 60s, Virginia Livingston's published research showed that the cancer microbe has a mycoplasma-like phase.)

At the 1991 San Francisco AIDS Conference, Montagnier claimed that a mycoplasma might be a needed co-factor for the AIDS virus to become lethal. Mycoplasmas found in the blood of AIDS patients are likely a source of additional infection, the Pasteur researcher declared.

Although Montagnier's mycoplasma research relates to the cancer microbe work, he has never admitted the connection, nor has he ever cited any of the medical literature showing pleomorphic and mycoplasma-like bacteria in KS and AIDS.

KS has always baffled the experts, especially as to how this century-old cancer fits into the new AIDS epidemic caused by HIV. When AIDS first broke out in Manhattan homosexuals, KS became the telltale sign of this new disease.

Until the early 1980s, KS in America was a very rare disease seen primarily in older Italian and Jewish men. After the AIDS virus was introduced in 1978, KS suddenly became a gay disease.

A CDC report on the first one-thousand AIDS cases states that the earliest gay KS cases were diagnosed in the first quarter of 1978. Whether the 1978 KS cases were "AIDS-related KS" is not clear because the CDC officials explain that these cases "probably represent the expected 'background' occurrence of KS--that is, KS disease not associated with AIDS."

Among those credited with the discovery of the first definite gay KS cases are: dermatologist Alvin Friedman-Kien, hematologist Linda Laubenstein, pathologist Geoffrey J. Gottleib, and epidemiologist Michael Marmor, all associated with the New York University Medical Center. All four appear as contributors to the CDC report on AIDS-related KS, published on July 3, 1981 (Kaposi's sarcoma and Pneumocystis pneumonia among homosexual men--New York City and California).

In AIDS: The Epidemic of Kaposi's Sarcoma and Opportunistic Infections (1984), Friedman-Kien claims: "Between the late fall of 1979 and the spring of 1981, a number of cases of disseminated Kaposi's sarcoma were suddenly recognized in New York City and California." In a New York Native interview (July 15, 1984), he declared, "AIDS did not exist in the United States before 1979." He also told a New York magazine reporter that he diagnosed his first gay KS case in February 1981. At the 1982 annual meeting of the American Dermatologic Association, Friedman-Kien announced that "the first KS cases were diagnosed in November 1979." Epidemiologist Michael Marmor also confirms that twenty gay men with KS were seen at New York University between March 1979 and August 1981. In his AIDS textbook, Geoffrey Gottlieb dates the earliest gay KS cases to "the beginning of 1979, or perhaps somewhat earlier." He writes, "In 1979 the cases of Kaposi's sarcoma diagnosed in young men were scattered among various medical institutions (especially in New York City). My own encounter ... was in the fall of 1979."

These KS experts attest to the fact that the earliest proven cases occurred in 1979. The hepatitis B vaccine trials officially began in 1978. Thus, gay KS began to appear shortly after the gay experiment.

In 1980, new experimental trials began in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Denver, Chicago, and St. Louis. In the fall of 1979 the first East Coast case of Pneumocystis pneumonia was diagnosed in New York City. In the fall of 1980 the first West Coast cases of AIDS appeared in Los Angeles and San Francisco.

In 1989, ten years after the first KS cases were diagnosed in Manhattan, a study by Robert Biggar's research group reported no KS cases in young men in New York City during the years 1973-1976. However, by 1985, the incidence of KS in "nevermarried men" in Manhattan increased 1850 times; and in San Francisco the rate of KS increased over 2000 times!

The only factor to account for this spectacular rise in young gays in these two cities was the "introduction" of HIV into the male homosexual community. The fact that both cities were sites of the hepatitis B vaccine trials during the years 19781980 is never mentioned as a factor in the explosion of KS.

A 1990 report in Lancet, penned by Valerie Beral and three other physician-epidemiologists at the CDC in Atlanta, concludes that KS is now 20,000 times more common in AIDS patients than in the general population. The researchers also claim that the incidence of new cases of AIDS-related KS is declining in gay men.

A 1985 autopsy study clearly showed that 94% of AIDS patients from various risk groups had internal KS. Disregarding this study, the CDC doctors now report that KS occurs in only 15% of gay men (down from over 30% at the beginning of the epidemic). The reason for the decline in KS is unclear. Perhaps fewer KS cases are reported, especially if the AIDS patient also suffers from other opportunistic infections. For example, the CDC researchers admit that a KS case "is not reported if it occurs after the AIDS case has been reported to the CDC." Another possible reason for the decline of KS may be that fewer KS skin lesions are biopsied and reported to cancer registries. Now that physicians are more familiar with the appearance of skin KS, fewer biopsies are required for diagnosis. In addition, due to fears of contagion on the part of pathologists, very few AIDS cases are autopsied. In the absence of an autopsy, many cases of internal KS obviously go undiagnosed and unreported.

CDC statistics primarily reflect the incidence of external skin KS. But, KS is both an external skin cancer and an internal cancer in AIDS patients. For this reason, the current 15% incidence of KS in AIDS is a highly questionable, if not meaningless, statistic.

After finishing her research at the CDC, Valerie Beral and a group of English epidemiologists conducted a similar KS study at a communicable disease surveillance center at Oxford. Their final report entitled, "Is the risk of Kaposi's sarcoma in AIDS patients in Britain increased if sexual partners came from the United States or Africa?" appeared in the British Medical Journal (March 16, 1991).

In Beral's study, gay Englishmen were questioned about the "country of possible source of HIV infection." After statistical analysis, it was concluded that KS occurred in 31% of men whose source of infection was from the United States. (This high rate of KS is similar to the 30% incidence of "gay KS" in the early years of the U.S. epidemic.) Beral found KS in 26% of men whose contact source was Africa; and in 19% of men whose source was from their own countrymen.

In a startling statistical conclusion presented in Skin & Allergy News (October 1991), the British epidemiologists state: "These findings indicate that the agent that causes KS was introduced into the British population mainly from the United States." A more recent study by Beral proposes a fecal-oral origin for the suspected KS infectious agent in gay men! Undoubtedly this study will support the view of some homophobes who believe that "queers eat shit."

As I studied these epidemiologic reports it seemed to me that official statistics were being manipulated to suit the agenda of the government agency sponsoring the research. For example, in a gay Englishman with multiple sexual partners, how could it be definitely determined that a specific American or an African transmitted HIV to the patient? In my view, the conclusions drawn from these British KS statistics are homophobic, racist, un-American and unscientific.

In the nineteenth century, KS was first an Austrian disease. A century later, "epidemic" KS became widely known as a Black African disease, while remaining unknown in African-Americans. Twenty years ago in New York City and Los Angeles it was regarded as a "Jewish male disease." Suddenly in the early 1980s, KS became a gay cancer "out of Africa." A Black heterosexual epidemic African disease had strangely transformed itself into a white homosexual disease in Manhattan. Now in the 1990s, English KS has suddenly become a gay "fecal-oral" disease imported from the U.S. and Africa.

There was never a disease quite like AIDS and KS. Was it one, or was it two diseases? Was it old or new? Was it an Austrian, African, Jewish, white, Black, gay or straight disease? The answer seemed to depend on who was doing the research--and their agenda.

To further confuse and bewilder the most serious student of AIDS, some leading epidemiologists now claim "another" cause for KS. And they further claim that the epidemic of KS had nothing to do with AIDS and HIV! In other words, KS is now thought to be a separate epidemic caused by another, heretofore unknown infectious agent that is being sexually transmitted in the gay (but not the straight) community!

This new view is proposed by Alvin Friedman-Kien, who discovered "gay KS" in Manhattan in 1981. Ignoring dermatologic reports of cancer bacteria in KS, Friedman-Kien's microbiologic research indicates that KS may be caused by a new strain of the wart virus. (Dermatology Times, January 1992).

The idea of a new, sexually transmitted KS infectious agent seems ludicrous. For a century there has never been a recorded case in which a Jew, an Italian, or a Black African man transferred KS to his sexual partner. Even in HIV-infected gay couples, it is not common to find KS in both partners! What kind of infectious venereal disease passes readily between gays, but not between straights? Or spreads between men, but not women? Or spreads commonly among Black Africans, but not African-Americans?

In my busy clinic in Hollywood, located in one of the largest AIDS epicenters, not one of our eight dermatologists has ever seen KS in a woman! In questioning 20 other physicians in my medical group who work extensively with AIDS patients, not one has seen a woman with KS! One physician recalled seeing a case at another institution: the patient was a woman who had undergone a sex change.

What about the Haitian connection and the widespread belief that promiscuous gays brought HIV back from Port-au-Prince?

This theory was often repeated in the press in the early years of the epidemic, but there is little basis for it. According to epidemiologists Jean Pape and Warren Johnson, "the first patient with Kaposi's sarcoma was diagnosed in Haiti in June 1979, and the first patient with an opportunistic infection was seen in February 1980." Hospital records from three private hospitals in Port-au-Prince revealed no cases of KS during the period 1968 to 1983. A review of all the Haitian data reveals that "AIDS probably did not exist in Haiti before 1978."

In the early years of the epidemic, Haitians living in the U.S. were classified as "high risk." After much political pressure, the CDC finally removed Haitians from the high-risk category.

In The Epidemiology of AIDS, Richard Kaslow and Donald Francis fantasize about the origins of HIV, writing that "it is easy to suppose the infection was first acquired by a traveler in a land with primitive and remote areas." Kaslow and Francis are "doubtful that the origins of the virus will ever be fully known."

Ignoring this pessimism, Pape and Johnson believe that AIDS originated in Africa, came to the U.S. and Europe, "and was subsequently introduced into Haiti by either tourists or returning Haitians."

No discussion of AIDS science would be complete without mentioning the claim of Peter Duesberg, a Berkeley professor of molecular biology, who insists that HIV is not the cause of AIDS. According to Duesberg, AIDS results from drugs and promiscuity; and HIV has nothing to do with AIDS. Duesberg's views seem to have special appeal for HIV-infected gays, who reject the official view that they are infected with a fatal virus.

Interviewed in the London Sunday Times (April 26, 1992),Duesberg believes AIDS "is the result of an explosion in the use of recreational drugs, such as cocaine, which badly damage the immune system." He considers HIV only as a blood "marker" associated with promiscuous behavior and illicit drug use.

Most scientists disagree with Duesberg's opinion that HIV doesn't cause AIDS. Nevertheless, Duesberg's ideas make sense to some gay activists, to some holistic practitioners, and even to a few well-respected AIDS experts. Details of Duesberg's unorthodox theories have appeared in prestigious scientific journals such as Cancer Research and Science. He has also sensationalized his views by telling news reporters that he would allow himself to be injected with HIV to prove the virus is harmless. However, Duesberg refuses to be inoculated with Gallo's virus. He reportedly told Gallo: "The virus couldn't come from your laboratory; it would have to be cleaner than that." (AIDS Weekly, July 6, 1987)

Duesberg declares that AZT, universally prescribed for HIV infection, is "incompatible with life." He believes a "cofactor" other than HIV is required to produce "full-blown" AIDS. I agree with Duesberg on these two points. Perhaps Duesberg will investigate the published cancer microbe work, and comment on the idea that AIDS is a man-made epidemic with a genetically engineered laboratory virus.

It is unfortunate that leading AIDS investigators are unwilling to consider all aspects of AIDS science, even the controversial ones. The reason is obvious. AIDS research is big business. As a result, many scientists are highly protective of their own research. They often refuse to give credit to other investigators doing similar research, especially if that research competes with their own.

The leading lights in AIDS research seem more interested in money, fame, media attention, ego-gratification, scientific politics, and Nobel prizes, than they do in sharing research to find a cure for AIDS. After four decades of medical practice, I am totally disillusioned with medical "science." I remain convinced that the medical establishment does not really want a cure for cancer or AIDS.

I have colleagues who try to avoid consultations with HIV positive patients. I know doctors who won't touch the skin of gay men. I have heard of physicians who tell AIDS sufferers that they are not wanted as patients. I know Jewish doctors with yarmulkes who patronize gay Jews with AIDS. I am aware of Christian physicians who quote divine scripture in their condemnation of homosexuality. This is not paranoia, nor is it my imagination.

In MD magazine (January 1987) a Georgia physician writes: "AIDS represents the consequences of violating God's rules regarding sexuality." A Pennsylvania surgeon declares, "We used to hate faggots on an emotional basis. Now we have a good reason." An internist from Oklahoma believes, "Homosexuality is a sin, deserving the death penalty."

A 1986 report in the Western Journal of Medicine surveyed 2,364 members of the San Diego County (California) Medical Society regarding physicians' attitudes about homosexuality, homosexual colleagues, and patients. One-quarter of the doctors held strongly negative attitudes towards gays; and 30% would not admit a homosexual to medical school. Almost 40% would discourage gays from training in pediatrics and psychiatry.

A later survey, also published in the Western Journal of Medicine (January 12, 1992), contained equally shocking data. Of 400 Los Angeles primary care physicians interviewed, 36% refused to provide care for HIV-infected patients, and another 12% indicated their unwillingness to do so if these patients came to their offices.

Charles Lewis, professor of medicine at UCLA and author of the study, told the Los Angeles Times (December 12, 1991), "Many Southern California physicians share biases against groups hard hit by HIV--specifically homosexuals and intravenous drug abusers. They also fear infection themselves and the prospect that HIV-infected patients could alienate other clients. We have a fair amount of physicians who obviously have chosen not to keep these patients in their practice. Resistance is so strong among many physicians that attempting to alter their attitudes would be a waste of time and effort."

Clearly, without a change of attitude on the part of AIDS scientists and physicians in general, there is little hope that the worldwide AIDS crisis will be solved.

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Excerpted from QUEER BLOOD: The Secret AIDS Genocide Plot by Alan Cantwell Jr., M.D., published by ARIES Rising Press, P.O. Box 29532, Los Angeles, California 90029 $12.95 (Telephone: 213-462-6458)

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