11 Comments
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Eugine Nier's avatar

Are we sure these Africans even have HIV? Remember for reasons of cost an actual HIV test isn't required for a diagnosis in Africa.

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Emil O. W. Kirkegaard's avatar

If they don't have HIV, why does the model work? It makes no sense on any alternative view I can think of. On the other hand, it makes perfect sense based on the mainstream view that HIV caused AIDS which caused a lot of deaths, which then get prevented once we started distributing effective medicine for it, and the expected interaction effect is strongly confirmed based on the model.

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Eugine Nier's avatar

What model? The whole premise of your article was figuring out why the model doesn't.

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Emil O. W. Kirkegaard's avatar

The models in the study fit very well and the predicted effects all were found, including the interaction. This is a strong prediction from mainstream model which was confirmed, and HIV denial model does not predict this.

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Mark's avatar

Higher life expectancy of some subgroups with HIV is not new (in 2020 I read some numbers in the US). If you get treated, you see medics more often than you might as a non-HIV male (guys are prone to do too little prevention/check ups). Some even might reconsider their lifestyle (smoking, drugs, unprotected intecourse).

In short, hooray for antiviral drugs! And some shame on Trump for killing that program (African countries or the Gates et al. should have taken over long ago, though.).

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John Kundrat's avatar

Just a suggestion, obtain and read Peter Duesberg's Inventing the AIDS Virus.

Dan Kurt

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Emil O. W. Kirkegaard's avatar

Maybe if he wrote a shorter book. Not gonna read an outdated 700+ page book on some fringe theory. My prior on his idea is ~0%.

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Rita Skeeter's avatar

Yes, science has evolved a lot in the past forty years on the understanding of the infection.

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Rita Skeeter's avatar

I read it. Duesberg should not have been pilloried from suggesting HIV does not cause AIDS. However, he in the past forty years has been proven wrong.

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Realist's avatar

"I read it. Duesberg should not have been pilloried from suggesting HIV does not cause AIDS."

He did not suggest it; he outright denied it.

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Rita Skeeter's avatar

When I wrote 'suggest' I didn't mean he hinted at it. I did mean he put forth the concept.

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