Re: reality check with respect to AIDS - did you read the article I posted to Jay last week?
Message 15861088
More:
"China stops Aids hero speaking out in US "
guardian.co.uk
"Chinese villagers dying of AIDS make desperate appeal for help
BEIJING, May 30 (AFP) - A group of peasants from a village in central China devastated by AIDS said Wednesday
the government had done almost nothing to help the dying, the orphaned or those too poor to buy medicine.
The seven -- including two young boys whose parents died from AIDS and an elderly woman who lost two adult
children -- travelled hundreds of kilometers (miles) to Beijing from Wenlou village in central Henan province in a
last ditch appeal for help.
Risking retribution, they brought a letter written by village leaders which accused the local authorities of heartless
indifference.
The letter said a clinic that was opened after the plight of the village -- where 65 percent of residents have tested
positive for AIDS or HIV -- became public is a sham.
It accused the staff of pilfering medicine and spending their time drinking and playing cards.
"We hope the leaders will do something concrete, set up a good clinic, provide free medical care for the sick,
think of a plan for the children who have a hard time fending for themselves after they are left behind by parents
who died from AIDS," said the letter.
The villagers contracted the AIDS virus by selling blood when scores of blood purchasing stations were set up in
the province in the mid-1980s to make money from a traditional reluctance to donate blood.
The stations, both legal ones set up by the local health authorities and illegal ones, had poor safety standards.
Blood withdrawn was pooled in a tub and, after the plasma was extracted, pumped back into villagers.
The appalling scale of the problem first emerged in Wenlou, but two volunteer doctors who visited other villages
in Henan said they believed as many as one million people contracted HIV from selling blood.
The villagers of Wenlou used the money earned to build mud-brick houses, as well as to pay taxes and school
fees.
They began dying two years ago and so far more than 40 have died from the disease while four others
committed suicide because they could not afford proper medicine, villagers told AFP.
County government officials responded to reports in the Chinese and international media by setting up a clinic,
but the villagers said the clinic was only properly staffed and stocked with medicine when higher authorities visit
the village.
One clinic doctor was dismissed after he took medicine for his own use and then charged a patient for it, the
villagers said.
"The clinic is useless. It is set up only for the local officials to show their superiors they are doing something
about the problem," the letter said.
The villagers have only received small donations from individuals and some flour from the Hong Kong Red Cross,
and they suspect the local authorities have pocketed other donations.
The local authorities have tried to cover up the problem to avoid any blame -- reporters have been stopped from
going near the village and one volunteer doctor was also ordered out.
"When we asked for help, the county health department director asked us 'Why did you have to sell blood!' But
back then the blood stations set up by the health department advertised that 'Donating blood is glorious' and 'No
harm to health,'" said the letter.
The blood stations were outlawed in 1998. The government has not studied the magnitude of AIDS infection from
selling blood, but many experts believe the problem could be a timebomb if not dealt with properly."
ptd.net
Robert Mugabe - "“It says here on this document signed by IMF officials… ‘We gave aids to Zimbabwe’. It is there in black and white!”
anastrophe.co.za
"Mbeki's Aids experts split over link to HIV
Report spares South African president from embarrassment"
guardian.co.uk
"MBEKI FINGERS CIA IN AIDS CONSPIRACY"
virusmyth.com
"In South Africa, AIDS and a Dangerous Denial"
chora.virtualave.net
"Up to 95 percent of HIV-positive probably ignorant of fact: UNAIDS "
ptd.net
"Around the world, 60 million people are infected with HIV or suffering from full-blown AIDS, which
already threatens to slash life expectancy in parts of Africa to less than 45 years, the U.N. secretary-general said
Thursday. Kofi Annan appealed to members of the World Health Organization for more donations to a new Global AIDS and Health Fund recently set up by the U.N. chief. The United States has donated $200 million, but European nations are cool to the idea."
ptd.net
"For Burmese, Repression, AIDS and Denial"
aegis.com
"The AIDS Conspiracy."
sonic.net
"Will AIDS Kill Russia?"
worldinternettimes.com
"Pokrovsky notes that, as in some other countries, a battle is going on in Russia between a conservative lobby and what he calls a "democratic" one. He says the conservatives -- influenced by religious or communist values -- are against full sex education in the schools. The "democrats," he says, believe children should be taught to take into account that many people have several sexual partners in the course of their lives -- and are therefore more at risk of contracting the disease."
rferl.org
"AIDS in Russia: conservatism may kill millions"
jinx.sistm.unsw.edu.au
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Conclusion - the spread of the AIDS epidemic world-wide is exacerbated by denial, finger-pointing and blame-shifting. Many believe that there is a conspiracy to spread AIDS. Many believe that the very fact that AIDS exists is because of a conspiracy. And many prefer to pretend that AIDS doesn't exist, or that it just kills "those people," you know, gays, drug users, prostitutes. Peasants. Nobody important.
_______________________________________
P.S. There was no "Great Inflation" in the 1920's. In fact, there was a Great Deflation, and a Great Contraction. The Great Inflation was during WWI and immediately afterward, and the Great Deflation started in about 1921. The fact that an intelligent, well-educated man like you doesn't know that is exactly the reason why I am working on a book about it.
P.P.S. We've been going through a contraction/deflation recently, too. If you want proof, look at the price of gold. But as you may know, conspiracy theorists claim that we are actually experiencing inflation, and the price of gold is being kept down through manipulation. Reality check - look at the price of other commodities. All going down except for oil, which really is manipulated. Actually, oil's going down now, too.
joc.com |
