If the author of this book/article persists in using the offensive and misleading word,'denial', it would be to his credit if he could at least be accurate as to what the 'denial' is about. Among all the dissidents mentioned in the article, including President Mbeki, there isn't a single person who 'denies' the disease and conditions collectively called AIDS. What they deny is that HIV has been convincingly shown to be the cause of any of them.

The author(s) here obviously feel entitled to the luxury of simply stating things like 'The World Health Organisation and the MCC had classified AZT safe', to show President Mbeki's 'folly'. While the author's inhabit an admirably uncomplicated world, where the ycan simply accept sweeping statements like that without a moment's critical thought, others are not equally blessed,so allow me to address a few points:

In the article Tshabalala Msimang's 'folly' is exemplified by her doubting following politically biased 'preliminary' conclusions:

"In October 1999, Tshabalala-Msimang had rejected a report favouring the use of AZT by South Africa's MCC on the grounds that it had not been subject to a satisfactory review process. A month later, she commissioned the Cochrane Centre, an international health-care NGO that reviews clinical trials on new drugs and has branches all over the world, to research the risks of ARVs, especially AZT. Their preliminary study found strong evidence that both an intensive or shorter course of AZT was effective in decreasing the risk of mother-to-child transmission of HIV, even in breastfed babies. The most serious adverse effect the researchers identified was anaemia, but this condition tended to disappear once the full course of drugs had been concluded. Nevirapine, less expensive than AZT, was found to be both safe and effective. "

Beneath I give excerpts from a few of the many, many peer-reviewed review articles Msimang might have based her scepticism on:

"A lead review article (by Kohler & Lewis, pp. 166-72) cites “therapeutic experience”—that is, observations on human babies—that NRTIs, the backbones of standard antiretroviral treatment, damage the mitochondria.

Further: “Clinical and biological observations of mitochondrial dysfunction in children exposed to zidovudine (azidothymidine, AZT) during the perinatal period rapidly followed similar observations in animal experiments”—these were uninfected children born to HIV-infected mothers. One third of the babies had hyperlactatemia, which seemed to reverse within some months after treatment ceased but did sometimes lead to lactic acidosis, which can be life-threatening. Between 1 in 20 and 1 in 35 babies also developed severe neurological symptoms during the first 2 years of life, a phenomenon confirmed in several other studies (Benhammou et al., pp. 73-8).

Again, in the article by Sherine Chan et al. (pp. 190-200):

“mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) damage has been observed in both human and mouse neonates following perinatal exposure to AZT and AZT/3TC” as well as “NRTI-induced heart damage . . . in human infants”. Divi et al. confirm that “Transplacentally exposed human and monkey newborn infants show similar evidence of nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor-induced mitochondrial toxicity”. Witt et al. (pp. 322-9) reiterate that “transplacental ZDV exposure is genotoxic in humans”.

“perinatal exposure to nucleoside analogs puts children at elevated risk of developing cancers later in life” (Wogan, pp. 210-4). In cultured cells, AZT produced “micronuclei, chromosomal aberrations, sister chromatid exchange, shortened telomeres, and other genotoxic effects” (Olivero, pp. 215-23). In experiments with mice, “Mutagenicity experiments with ABC [abacavir] alone, or in combination with AZT-3TC, were complicated by the extreme cytotoxicity of ABC” (Torres et al., pp. 224-38); “all NRTIs with antiviral activity against HIV-1 may cause host cell DNA damage and mutations, and impose a cancer risk” (Carter et al., pp. 239-47). “AZT, 3TC, and the combination of AZT and 3TC are transplacental mutagens” (Von Tungeln et al., pp. 258-69). Rats and mice dosed with AZT developed hemangiosarcoma (a “rare, rapidly growing, highly invasive variety of cancer”), mononuclear cell leukemia, liver cancers, and gliomas (brain tumors) (Walker et al., pp. 283-98); also “alveolar/bronchiolar adenomas and carcinomas . . . benign and malignant lung neoplasms”, since “incorporation of AZT or its metabolites into DNA, oxidative stress, and genomic instability may be the contributing factors to the mutation profile and development of lung cancer” (Hue-Hua Hong et al., pp. 299-306).

As for the touted 'safety and effectiveness' of Nevirapine, I refer the interested readers to Celia Farber's article in Harper's, 'Out of Control: AIDS and the corruption of Medical Science'.

http://harpers.org/archive/2006/03/0080961

The article's author is also pleased to cite this passage:

'But the first extensive and broadly credible surveys on the incidence of HIV/ AIDS, conducted independently by the South African Medical Research Council and Statistics SA in 2000 and 2001, painted a bleak picture. They estimated that 5.3million South Africans would be infected with the virus by the end of 2002, and that it would be killing 600 people a day.[46]A government report leaked in late March 2004 said 100 000 public servants were HIV-positive, presenting a very real threat to normal government administration.'

I don't know why we woul dbe given the first ' broadly credible surveys on the incidence of HIV/AIDS', but not the latest communtiy survey, which show a complete miscalculation:

The US Census Bureau has created two models to estimate future South African population size; one is a 'with AIDS' model, and one a 'without AIDS' model.

(1) With AIDS model, 2007: 43.997.828

(2) Without AIDS model, 2007: 2007 49.282.246

Actual population according to Community Survey 2007: 48 502 063

In other words, the model estimating the size of the South African population WITHOUT HIV/AIDS was almost SPOT ON!

The model based on the premise that HIV is sexually transmitted and deadly was OFF by 4.5 million.