Foo Fighters, HIV Deniers
A platinum-selling alt-rock group may be endangering their fans by promoting a dangerous myth.
Some rock stars want to free Tibet. Others want to save Mumia. The Foo Fighters, on the other hand, want their fans to ignore accepted medical wisdom about AIDS.
The multimillion-album-selling alternative rock outfit has thrown its weight behind Alive and Well, an "alternative AIDS information group" that denies any link between HIV and AIDS. In January, Foo Fighters bassist Nate Mendel helped organize a sold-out concert in Hollywood to benefit the group. Foo fans were treated to a speech by Alive and Well founder Christine Maggiore, who believes AIDS may be caused by HIV-related medications, anal sex, stress, and drug use, and implies that people should not get tested for HIV nor take medications to counter the virus. Free copies of Maggiore's self-published book, "What If Everything You Thought You Knew About AIDS Was Wrong?," in which she declares "there is no proof that HIV causes AIDS," were also passed out to the concert-goers.
HIV experts are alarmed by the possible impact of the Foo Fighters' embrace of Maggiore's theories on their potentially gullible young fans.
"Clearly, more research is needed on the factors that contribute to HIV infection and the development of AIDS," says Dorcus Crumbley of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for HIV, STD, and TB Prevention. "However, the conclusions of more than two decades of epidemiologic, virologic, and medical research are that HIV infection is transmissible through sexual contact, injecting drug use, perinatally, and from receiving blood or blood products ... (and) the scientific evidence is overwhelming that HIV is the cause of AIDS."
Adds Crumbley: "The myth that HIV is not the primary cause of AIDS ... could cause (HIV-positive people) to reject treatment critical for their own health and for preventing transmission to others."
"When it comes to such a complex health topic, it behooves the band to have really researched what they are endorsing," says Diane Tanaka, an attending physician at the Children's Hospital of Los Angeles, where she works with a large population of high-risk and HIV-infected low-income youth. "(The Foo Fighters) have a big responsibility in terms of (their) public role and the impact that they can have on young people. Is this band willing to take responsibility for a young person engaging in risky, unprotected sex because of information they've gotten from the (Foo Fighters) or from Alive and Well?"
Alive and Well is one of several fringe groups that deny a link between HIV and AIDS. Similar theories have been put forth over the years by various far-right groups and anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists, and other so-called "HIV-refuseniks."
"Your risk of being hit by lightning is greater than that of contracting HIV through a one-time random sexual contact with someone you don't know here in America," says Maggiore, an HIV-positive Southern California resident with no formal training in medicine or the sciences. "And if (a young person) were to get a positive diagnosis, that does not mean they've been infected with HIV." The HIV-AIDS connection, maintains Maggiore, has been promoted by greedy drug companies.
Mendel says he was won over by Maggiore's book, and passed it around to the rest of the band, which includes former Nirvana drummer Dave Grohl. Mendel says that he would steer anyone considering an HIV antibody test toward Maggiore's group.
"If you test positive, you are pretty much given a bleak outlook and told to take toxic drugs to possibly ward off new infections," says Mendel.
With the other band members on board, Mendel aims to use the Foo Fighters' celebrity to get the message out to a broad audience. The Foo Fighters plan additional benefit shows, and have placed a banner ad on their Web site linking to Alive and Well. Mendel says that he does not have HIV, nor does he have any friends with HIV besides Maggiore, who has remained asymptomatic.
The most recent numbers from the Joint United Nations' HIV/AIDS Program estimate that 16.3 million people worldwide have died of AIDS-related causes since 1981. Medical research in the United States indicates that as many as 25 percent of the nation's estimated 40,000 annual HIV infections occur among 13- to 21-year-olds. Maggiore, however, maintains that worldwide HIV infections and AIDS deaths are exaggerated by the CDC and the World Health Organization, even in regions like sub-Saharan Africa, where two-thirds of the world's HIV-infected people live.
Maggiore's message has apparently penetrated the minds of at least some Foo aficionados. She says she has heard from many Foo fans since the show -- one of whom, she says, now works at the Alive and Well office.
"AIDS is a toxic disease caused by either long-term recreational drug abuse or short-term anti-HIV medications," writes a 22-year-old member of the Alive and Well-affiliated Students Reappraising AIDS on the Foo Fighters' Web-based message board. "HIV is not spread sexually, nor is it the cause of any disease."
Other fans are less impressed. Damian Purdy, a 21-year-old Winnipeg, Canada resident and devoted Foo Fighters fan, is outraged by the band's position. "By supporting this, the Foo Fighters have entered an arena that they have no business being in. The truth is that a rock concert is not the appropriate platform for these views to be expressed. I think the Foo Fighters have more influence than they realize," he says.
For his part, Mendel remains convinced that the media and the medical establishment are keeping the truth about HIV and AIDS from the public. The Foo Fighters, he insists, will continue to use their celebrity to bring "light to the issue."
Is he worried that the group might be endangering the lives of some of its listeners?
"I'm absolutely confident that I'm doing the right thing," Mendel answers. "No, I wouldn't feel responsible for possibly harming somebody. I (feel) I'm doing the opposite."
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Yeah, well, you know....I'm sure Eliza Jane Scovill knows her life was cut short by about 90 years, thanks to her mother's uneducated BELIEFS about the "harmlessness" of HIV. Thanks Mom!
What the Foo Fighters say it's TRUTH. Go here: http://www.virusmyth.net/aids/
Dear Mother Jones:
YOUR ATTENTION please...
Not just the great ALIVEANDWELL.ORG, but ALSO Stefan Lanka,Ph.D. (http://www.oikos.org/aids/intlanka.htm#Zenger's) AND The Perth Group (http://www.theperthgroup.com/)DEMONSTRATES that HIV has never been isolated according to the Pasteur Institute criteria of 1973, and therefore it's probably what's called an "endogenous retrovirus" -- a creation of the body's own genetic material that looks and functions partly like a virus, but is not an infection because it comes from the body's own cells.
Thanks in ADVANCE.
Josias (videoclip@mail.pt)
i like the foos music, but stick to the music guys. I have a feeling that 20 years of worldwide independant SCIENTIFIC research, has been more insightful than a book written by some freak who is obviously in denial about her own condition. Get real.
Sickening. Reckless quackery by pop stars. People will die because of this misinforation, and I have lost all respect for the Foo Fighters.
Wow...in this day of medical wizardry there are still those who believe in a global conspiracy to force the HIV/AIDS connection upon us to sell medicine?? How does that compute, Foo(l)s? The HIV/AIDS connection is real, not imagined. The death rate in Sub-Saharan Africa is much higher than it should be due to the same denialist voodoo that these people are preaching. Sad. Their influence is being used to send some of their fans t an early grave...sleep well, Foo(l)s??
Not supporting either side here; but, tend to operate from the paradigm opposite of what is considered standard. Those arguing in favor of orthodoxy, why do we have any reason to believe in such. Wouldn't that be like believing in "god?" Some claim existence while some deny. All we have is the highly controlled media telling us what to believe and how to react. Why should we believe so called "experts" in a society that values the dollar over all else? These people don't care about life; they care about money. I think most people tend to believe what is generally accepted as true, but there is no such thing as objective fact. How many people must agree on something before it is considered factual. I don't believe any number of people make it such. We create our own realities. What experience do any of you have with the "HIV" virus? I don't have any personally, so how can I accept such a theory when I see the world as constantly trying to market something to me?
this is an interesting discussion because it is about a topic that is SERIOUS. There are LOTS of serious things to discuss. But serious things should be discussed seriously. If you are serious about this topic, then let's go fact finding and sharing information. no amount of rhetoric and impassioned speech can create facts. so let's find them out.
Hanna,
If Eliza Jane died from AIDS, why is the LA County Coroner's Office so reluctant to release the results of her HIV test? Indeed, why are Christine and Robin having to take them to court to get records which, being EJ's parents, they should have every entitlement?
Hmmm...could it be that perhaps, EJ was HIV-negative? Could it be, in fact, that the whole sordid incident was nothing more than a political maneuver to punish Christine for publicly speaking her beliefs about HIV? If you can think of ANY other reason why the coroner may be (illegally) sitting on the records, I'm all ears.
--- Gos
The coroners office did
The coroners office did release the test, she was HIV positive. Then her quack (can you be a quack if you have NO medical qualification at all, or do you just need to trade on an exceedingly small amount like the vet pathologist she got to re-perform the autopsy - couldn't find a people doctor to you up?) mother filed a lawsuit claiming breach of confidence and privacy as a result of the reports release. 3 indipendent experts examined the child, all of whom have no ties to pharmaceutical companies, and all found her death to be the result of AIDS related infection. Then she got a VET to redo the autopsy, a vet who by the way was on her little board of insanity over there at "Alive and Well".
All this just prior to her own death of pneumonia... AIDS related pneumonia. But you're right, her kid definately had an allergic reaction to anti-biotics, and all the doctors somehow magically missed it. That's why she was malnourished, underweight, under-sized and had brain infections. All just a big allergic reaction. That just really and totally all adds up to me and there is no way any of that is the desperate attempts of her mother to avoid at all costs the reality of the situation. But that's fine. Keep advising pregnant women to avoid treatment and breastfeed their children. Oh, and advocate unprotected sex. Awesome.
Regarding the preventable death of Christine Maggoire's innocent child, her HIV test results don't even matter. First of all, she died of PJP pneumonia, an opportunistic disease that only happens in HIV patients after your immune system has been destroyed. Furthermore, her test results would have undoubtedly been positive, as babies carry their mother's antibodies until almost 18 months (despite what these quacks claim)
It is a serious injustice, that such a "free thinking, independent band" with so much influence would attach their name to such a dangerous cause. Aren't there a few other more legitimate causes that need their support in this world?
Box,
Yours is the sort of delusional rationalization that only DEFENDS unsubstantiated religious belief. Strangely, although you are unaware of it, it renders your point moot as well. If we can know nothing, then of what point is your rambling to suggest we cannot? So your point is pointless and perhaps Christian right-wing Republicans are correct in even their most delusional assumptions.
Simply, you're wrong. There IS a distinction between conclusions based off of empirical evidence, and a predetermined conclusion where 'facts' are chosen to fit its criteria. We don't decide our own reality. We're just especially good at denying it when it stares at us in the face.
If you're correct, which you aren't, then disease, war, and poverty are all illusions. So why do you care? Join the real world. It isn't the best, but we've got liquor.
About 12 years ago I discovered the myth and politics behind the HIV causes over 28 different diseases hoax. It started with one then they just added more including starvation as a disease to fall under the AIDS umbrella. HIV has NEVER been isolated as a retro virus and major scientist world wide are exposing the junk science behind the political HIV cause for auto- immune to cancer to starvation swindle. People must wake up and do their own research.
Wow, that's about as intelligent as denying the Holocaust.
So the experts are saying not taking toxic drugs 5 times a day is bad. Whats the worst that could happen, they die which is what the "experts" say is gonna happen to them anyway. What would be worse is if these drugs really were the culprit and healthy people were being killed by years of piosonous chemotherapy. Come on people is it really so hard to believe that swallowing poison 5 times a day is going to damage your immune system? Read the label for drugs like AZT it says right on them that the drug may cause aids like symptoms.
"anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists,"
As a Jew, I'm thoroughly disgusted with your article mentioning ant-semite groups. Stop with the boogeyman every article. Now I'm supposed to equate Foo Fighters with anti-semites??? I WILL NOT EQUATE YOUR LIES WITH ANTI-SEMITISM. YOU OFFEND ME AS A JEW. I'm sick of this not so subtle garbage. Wake up....we have.
There is no certitude for me in either way, I don't trust what comes from the media. With the "anti-semitic" comment at the end giving the hint that the article is very strongly biased, I would tend to believe more in the theory that HIV and Aids are not related.
When I see these crafted generalizations, I tend to suspect all informations that came with it as lies aiming to divide and bring hate.
If you think the remark about anti-semitics being supporters of the HIV myth makes this article biased than you're an idiot. The author is merely making a reference to a groups' views. What you're doing is flagrantly distorting what he says and taking it to the most extreme interpretation.
Also, to believe one woman and a few organizations over decades of proved science is idiotic. This woman is a hack with no scientific background who has no idea what she's talking about. The social irresponsibility of her and the foo fighters' statements is mind boggling. People are going to end up dead much sooner than they would have if they believe this peoples' statements.
Why doesn't the LA County Sheriff's Office release Eliza-Jane's HIV status? Because they're not allowed to by law... A convenient issue the AIDS deniers like to gloss over.
One of the many lies of omission perpetrated by the deniers. They'll never address the scientific criticism leveled at their studies, etc. The deniers belong with the intelligent design movement, and the young-Earth creationists.
Wow Josias. Way to use fancy science jargon that you don't understand to make comments on a field you know nothing about. Congratulations on googling words like "endogenous" and "retrovirus" and still messing up the definitions. You must be so proud to find someone with PhD (in marine biology btw) to agree with your crazy ideas. The same "scientist" that denies the existence of the hepatitis viruses (even though they have been isolated and crystalized) (???????). As someone who has their PhD in microbiology and has studied viruses for a decade, it is good to know that our opponents in the battle to combat AIDS and HIV is someone like you. Now if we could just get baby jesus/the government/big pharma/santa claus to stop making up "fake diseases" maybe people would stop dying.
Okay, so Christine Maggiore's 3-year-old daughter died of AIDs in 2005. Christine died of AIDs last month. The Alive and Well AIDs Alternatives website should be changing its name to Dead and Buried. Maybe Foo Fighters needs to change the band's name to "You Shall Know Them By the Trail of the Dead." Sorry, already taken.
Obviously great musicians but scientific idiots and dangerous to others.
Go and have a look at
Go and have a look at Duesberg's research and science and look through the medical journals. Make up your own mind. I did. I just accepted the HIV/AIDS link as fact. The scientists have not. Big Pharma are one of the most powerful industries on earth...just check out their US lobby groups. For example:
"Washington, June 24, 2008 – Washington's largest lobby, the pharmaceutical industry, racked up another banner year on Capitol Hill in 2007, backed by a record $168 million lobbying effort, according to a Center for Public Integrity analysis of federal lobbying data. Among the industry's successes: getting two controversial laws extended and thwarting congressional efforts to restrict media ads for prescription drugs."
Stop reading mainstream news. It's bullshit. You should not comment without researching just a little bit about the subject. If you've some intelligence you will be surprised.
Only science can win over science
A BRIEF PRESENTATION;
http://aidsmyth.addr.com/mythtv/aidsmythbuster_on.htm
MYTHS vs. TRUTH;
http://www.healsd.org/lies.htm
MORE INFORMATION;
http://www.aliveandwell.org/
http://www.actupsf.com/
http://www.healtoronto.com/
http://www.whatisaids.com/
http://www.virusmyth.net/aids/index.htm
http://www.rethinking.org/aids/NYRethinkingAIDSSociety.html
http://www.robertogiraldo.com/eng/papers/TheCausesOfAids.html
http://www.users.bigpond.com/smartboard/aids/
http://www.aras.ab.ca/
http://www.duesberg.com/
http://aliveandwell-eugene.dreamhost.com/aidsgate/text7.htm
http://www.whatisaids.com/howthechroninventedaids.htm
All those websites must mean
All those websites must mean it's true. I should listen to them all out so that I'm not blindly believeing what mainstream media tells me. This is the same as american propaganda. Fight the power!
Why we should all believe denialists
When I have an ear infection or if I have heart disease, I look to Nate Mendel for medical guidance. Because, after all, he graduated high school! College and medical school is overrated....And, in any case, he's a bassist and plays in front of large audiences! That's just the sort of background I know I want for my medical problems. And if he thinks that HIV is not a problem, well then I trust his feeling and knowledge about this! Christine Maggoire is also the kind of person I would trust if I was sick. After all, she was a clothing importer and made lots of money! Plus she was so sure of herself, even after her daughter died, which must have been so hard for her to watch, she still believed that her daughter didn't die of AIDS. Of course the L.A. coroner's office is probably corrupt! As state employees, they probably get pharmaceutical company money and they are probably secretely evil. When the L.A. coroner's office said her daughter died of AIDS, she knew they had to be wrong. Anyway, they have medical professionals working there, so she knew she had to go to someone without medical training! He would know the truth! So she even went to someone who never did an autopsy on a human and he wrote up the truth! There's something to be said for such complete blind confidence! And now that Christine is dead (long story, but she too didn't die of AIDS...she was stressed out and died!), well I bet now her husband is just as confident as she was that there is no HIV, there is not HIV, there is no HIV! And Nate, well, Nate is probably just as sure as ever that Christine was right.
Please I urge you ALL to
Please I urge you ALL to read the scientific journals yourself if you don't believe the accepted view. I'm a medical student, I've seen people die of AIDS right infront of me and its not nice. Just ask yourself this question - if I injected you with a syringe full of suspense containing HIV would you REALLY believe that you are safe from AIDS? These people are an insult to every victim of HIV & AIDS
These people infuriate the medical world
We dont train our whole lives to prostitute ourselves out to the corporate world
We do have morals like the rest of humanity
Please see through the lies, you don't have to believe what I say EDUCATE YOURSELF, LEARN ABOUT HIV, LEARN ABOUT AIDS. Talk to doctors & scientists we're more than willing to do that for anyone
I wonder, medical student
I wonder, medical student who's seen people die of AIDS right in front of you: have you ever read an insert of ANY of the HIV tests? May I, a lay patient myself, ask, why does the ELISA test kit insert say:"At present, there is no recognised standard for establishing the presence and absence of HIV antibody in human blood." ? Why does the Western Blot test kit insert use the - in my uneducated eyes - highly unscientific collocation "presumed to be positive"? Finally, why does the Viral Load Test kit insert say: "The Amplicor HIV-1 Monitor Test is not intended to be used as a screening test for HIV or as a diagnostic test to confirm the presence of HIV infection."? You will argue, I'm sure, that the tests are used in combination, a person is not tested +/- based on one single test (ELISA screening). But excuse me, does 3 cases of a "maybe" make one "certainly" when combined?? Thank you for your response.
What do you say to this: "On
What do you say to this: "On May 4, 1984 your journal published four papers by a group led by Dr. Robert Gallo. We are writing to express our serious concerns with regard to the integrity and veracity of the lead paper among these four of which Dr. Mikulas Popovic is the lead author.[1] The other three are also of concern because they rely upon the conclusions of the lead paper. ...What prompts our communication today is the recent revelation of an astonishing number of previously unreported deletions and unjustified alterations made by Gallo to the lead paper. There are several documents originating from Gallo's laboratory that, while available for some time, have only recently been fully analyzed. These include a draft of the lead paper typewritten by Popovic which contains handwritten changes made to it by Gallo.[7] This draft was the key evidence used in the above described inquiries to establish that Gallo had concealed his laboratory's use of a cell culture sample (known as LAV) which it received from the Institut Pasteur. ...Gallo had also deleted Popovic's unambiguous statement that, "Despite intensive research efforts, the causative agent of AIDS has not yet been identified,” replacing it in the published paper with a statement that said practically the opposite, namely, “That a retrovirus of the HTLV family might be an etiologic agent of AIDS was suggested by the findings.” Signed by 37 researchers, medical doctors,etc.
http://rethinkingaids.com.93.seekdotnet.com/Home/tabid/146/Default.aspx
NOTE: Mohammed Al-Bayati is
NOTE: Mohammed Al-Bayati is the pathologist and toxicologist retained by EJ's parents
November 21st 2005
Dear Ms. Maggiore:
As a Professor of Pathology at the University of Illinois at Chicago, one of the nation’s largest medical schools, I analyze many similar reports in the course of a single week.
From my experience in this area, I find Al-Bayati’s report on Eliza Jane Scovill to be one of the most thorough and well-studied investigations I have ever reviewed. If more pathologists used Al-Bayati’s same logical and scientific methodology, I believe there would be little need for inquests, charges of medical malpractice and fraud, and certainly less medical error in autopsies, diagnosis, treatment, and critical care practices.
I would only emphasize what Dr. Al Bayati developed quite adequately from a technical standpoint in noting how the independent neuroconsultant failed to perform the proper controls for the p24 staining of the microglia and neurons in this case. It should not escape the attention of readers, especially those not familiar with the technical language of these of reports, that the detection of the p24 antigen is not in any way diagnostic of the presence of HIV, or any other virus or pathogenic state. Positive staining for p24 in this instance, as in all cases reported in the published literature, is without scientific basis since positive staining can also be found in normal tissues and contexts.
I believe Al-Bayati’s analysis and report represents the state of the art in terms of methodology, completeness, and accuracy, and serves as a textbook model of how to conduct a differential diagnosis.
Andrew Maniotis, PhD.
Professor of Pathology and
Program Director in the Cell and Developmental Biology of Cancer,
Department of Pathology, Anatomy and Cell Biology, and Bioengineering,
University of Illinois at Chicago, USA
