Something that hit us hard in the 90s and early 2000s, in the HIV research community, was the continuing and obstinate HIV/AIDS denialism of those at the top of the government and of the ANC: the incredulity of the international scientific community at the failure of our purported leaders to accept what was by then established scientific fact extended to us, for not being able to convince them.
Oh, we tried, though: colleagues and frinds of mine served - to no obvious avail - on Mbeki's set-up-to-fail advisory panel; I wrote an article for the Mail & Guardian - now inaccessible - out of sheer frustration and anger after a bemused Swedish scientist asked me "Why does your president not believe HIV causes AIDS?" after he had seen Mbeki on Swedish TV dismissing HIV as a problem; several of us got an open letter to Mbeki published in Nature in 2000, where we said:
"As long as Mr Mbeki is being advised by people with no credibility, we as South African scientists feel dangerously marginalized in the search for solutions to HIV/AIDS".
We were not nearly as hard hit, however, as people with AIDS: two studies which calculated the excess deaths due to AIDS in South Africa alone due to the failure to roll out ARVs, came up with between 300 000 and 340 000 preventable mortalities.
Now a New Scientist article has exposed the continuing lunacy of the AIDS denialist movement: Johnny Steinberg, in the June 20th Issue, discusses how a small coterie of hard-line activists are still trying to influence the public and governments. Steinberg covers the topic very well, and takes great care to debunk a series of popular myths, including "AIDS is not caused by HIV", "Antiretroviral drugs are poisons", "HIV tests are flawed", and "The lack of a widespread HIV epidemic is the west proves the orthodoxy is wrong". I diffidently note that our very own (OK, my!) HIV information web site at UCT did much the same thing a few years back, but then, so did many others across the world.
The points to be made are that there are still AIDS denialists; that they are pernicious and persuasive; they have done a great deal of damage, and they need to be combatted - and that this article is good ammunition in this fight.
Ed Rybicki
30/06/2009, 18:18
It's pretty shocking that that kind of "reasoning" is still allowed to persist, and given so much airtime. A bit like the continued teaching of creationism, or the labeling of evolution as a "theory" in the face of overwhelming proof.
I guess science is just to unpalatable for some people?
30/06/2009, 23:32
Science is pretty inaccessible to the average civilian - given that the average newspaper here has very little, and that often of dubious value, and what you get off the web is often worth what you paid for it.
Which is how Mbeki got into trouble...too much late night trawling after a session with Johnnie and Jack.
05/07/2009, 22:20
Ben Goodacre's "Bad Science" column in the Guardian is pretty good - and very popular.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/series/badscience
13/07/2009, 11:25
...and of course, in a coincidence that is mind-boggling enough enough to PROVE conclusively that coincidences happen, there I was reading Ben Goodacre's book "Bad Science" on holiday in the Karoo, before I saw this comment. Just goes to show...nothing, really!