Introduction

Part I: Books, Pamphlets and Monographs

Part II: Audiotapes

Part III: Articles:

Activism - AZT - Blood Testing & Screening - Cultural Issues & the Media - Experimental Therapies & Techniques - General - HIV Hypothesis - Holistic Therapies - Intravenous & Recreational Drugs - Mind & Spirit, Psychoneuroimmunology - Origins - Other Infections - Politics & Policies - Protease Inhibitors - Race & Colour - Related Issues - Safe & Unsafe Sex - Survivors - Vitamin Therapies & Nutrition

Part IV: Current Periodicals

Appendix I: Testing, Testing:
A Look at Our Most Popular Ritual

Appendix II: A Crisis is a Turning Point:
An Interview with Michael Ellner and Bud Weiss of HEAL (New York City)

Appendix III: Cocktails for One:
AIDS Treatment as a Social Sacrament

Book Catalogue

Ian Young is a poet and psychohistorian living in Toronto. His most recent books are The Stonewall Experiment: A Gay Psychohistory (Cassell) and The AIDS Cult (Asklepios). Ian Young Books

This annotated list of books and articles about AIDS is intended as a supplement to The AIDS Dissidents: An Annotated Bibliography, published by Scarecrow Press in 1993. That book, which is still available for $36.00 (U.S.) from the original publisher, Scarecrow Press, at 4720 Boston Way, Lanham, Maryland 20706, USA, is a bibliographic listing of books, articles, tapes and periodicals whose approach to AIDS differed from the orthodox, currently accepted, view. It included 737 entries from the period before 1993.

Since that volume appeared, scientific, political and journalistic disputes about the origins, nature and appropriate treatment of the various conditions grouped as AIDS have continued. A number of important new books critical of the AIDS establishment have been published. And a few new factors have been added, including the mass prescription of protease inhibitors to patients described as "HIV+", legal struggles over custody of children described as "HIV+," and a scientific dispute over whether the putative entity known as "HIV" even exists.

As of mid-2000, orthodox positions anchored in the HIV hypothesis remain politically dominant in the scientific and medical establishments, the press and the other main sources of information. Their continued hegemony depends on a continuing supply of people considered to have HIV or AIDS and drawn increasingly from impoverished populations. AIDS and AIDS administration are now a well-established, multi-billion dollar industry.

As this bibliography shows, a good deal of dissident information is available; nonetheless, critiques and alternative approaches continue to be dismissed, marginalized and censored, and "noncompliance" with the system of AIDS administration is strongly discouraged (see Appendix I), particularly in the communities considered most "at risk."

The fate of The AIDS Dissidents perhaps exemplifies the problems of dissent. Most of the intended customers of the book, i.e. the many and proliferating AIDS organizations, clinics, test sites and officially funded drop-in centres operating in the English-speaking world, felt it best to avoid the whole business of heresy altogether, and rejected the book for their libraries, perhaps feeling that providing dissident information would only cause trouble among otherwise docile clients and undermine "compliance." As a result, the book has sold poorly in comparison to my earlier bibliography with the same publisher, The Male Homosexual in Literature, which was welcomed by many libraries.

As the publishers of the original volume are understandably reluctant to issue a follow-up, I have decided to make this version of my supplementary notes publicly available on the Internet through HEAL (Toronto) and in photocopied, cerlox-bound form. The format follows approximately that of the original volume. Books, pamphlets and monograms are listed first, followed by audiotapes, and finally by articles, which have been divided into sections by subject as follows:

Activism; AZT; Blood Testing and Screening; Cultural Issues and the Media; Experimental Therapies and Treatments; General; HIV Hypothesis; Holistic Therapies; Intravenous and Recreational Drugs; Macrobiotic, Ayurvedic and Traditional Oriental Medicine; Origins; Other Infections; Politics and Policies; Protease Inhibitors; Race and Colour; Related Issues; Safe and Unsafe Sex; Survivors; Vitamin Therapies and Nutrition.

Those books which I have been able to examine have been briefly annotated, as have any articles whose titles are not self-explanatory. Publishers' addresses are included where available. A selection of current periodicals offering dissident views of AIDS completes the listings.

I have included, as appendices, three of my own articles not readily available. "Testing, Testing: A Look at Our Most Popular Ritual" is reprinted from the March 1997 issue of the Toronto magazine Icon. "A Crisis is a Turning Point" is a previously unpublished interview with Michael Ellner and Bud Weiss of HEAL (New York City). "Cocktails for One: AIDS Treatment as a Social Sacrament," reprinted from the December, 1998 issue of the Toronto journal The HIV Realist, is a follow-up to "Thinking Positive: The AIDS Cult and Its Seroconverts," which was published in the British journal Continuum and in the book The AIDS Cult (Asklepios Press), which I co-edited with John Lauritsen.

The books, pamphlets and monographs I consulted in compiling my initial and supplementary lists are now at the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Room in the University of Toronto. Many of the news items and periodical articles are in the archives of HEAL (Toronto).

I would like to thank all my colleagues in the dissident movement for their assistance with this supplement. I am especially grateful to Wulf, Anthony Brink, Robert Campbell, Michael Ellner, John Forbes, Karsten Johansson, Rob Johnston, John Lauritsen, Tony Leuzzi, David Mason, M. Dennis Paul, Jerry Rosco, Alex Russell, Carl Strygg, Doug Webb, Bud Weiss and Robert Wilson.

Al-Bayati, Mohammed Ali. Get All the Facts: HIV Does Not Cause AIDS. Toxi-Health International, 15- Bloom Dr., Dixon, CA 95620. 1999.

An ACT UP Chronology. ACT UP/New York City, 135 West 29 St., New York, NY 10001. 1994, 11 pp.
An illustrated chronology of the AIDS activist group ACT/UP New York, from its inception in March 1987 through May, 1994.

AIDS $$. Awake, 600 Mimosa Ave., Titusville, FL 32796.
A collection of pieces arguing AIDS as originating in chemical-biological warfare.

The AIDS Cure Project. The AIDS Cure Working Group, ACT UP/New York City, 135 West 29 St., New York, NY 10001. n.d., 22 pp.
An outline for a new approach to a cure for AIDS, inspired by the work of Nobel Prize winner Barbara McClintock.

Arno, Peter S., Ph.D. and Karyn L. Feiden. Against the Odds: The Story of AIDS, Drug Development, Politics & Profits. HarperCollins Publishers, 10 E. 53 St., New York, NY 10022. 1992, 314 pp.
This account of AIDS and AIDS activism is critical of the establishment but tends to pull its punches in saying little about radical dissent.

Asistent, Niro Markoff, with Paul Duffy. Why I Survive AIDS. Simon & Schuster, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020. 1991, 247 pp. Foreword by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross.
Personal testimony by a survivor.

Bokun, Branko. AIDS: A Different View. London, Vita Books, n.d. 18 pp.

Brody, Stuart. Sex at Risk. Transaction Publishers, 1997.

Brown, Raymond Keith. AIDS, Cancer & the Medical Establishment. Revised edition. Robert Speller and Sons, PO Box 411, New York, NY 10159.
See Vol. I for a review of the first edition.

Brown, Tony. Black Lies, White Lies. NY, William Morrow, 1995.
Talk-show host Brown's attack on white racism, black self-victimization and a number of sacred cows including integration and the orthodoxies of the AIDS establishment.

Burkett, Elinor. The Gravest Show on Earth: America in the Age of AIDS. Houghton Mifflin, 215 Park Ave. South, New York, NY 10003. 1995, 375 pp.
A biting, if somewhat superficial, look at the AIDS story as a ghastly clown-show (the cover shows a skull with a red rubber nose). Something of a mish-mash but contains some good quotes: "If going to the baths is really a game of Russian roulette, then the advice must be to throw the gun away, not merely to play less often." - Callen & Berkowitz.

Byrnes, Stephen. Overcoming AIDS with Natural Medicine. Centaur Books, 731 Makaleka Ave., Apt. C, Honolulu, HI 96816 - 6002. 1997.

Callaway, C. Wayne, M.D., with Catherine Whitney. Surviving with AIDS: A Comprehensive Program of Nutritional Co-Therapy. Little, Brown, 34 Beacon St., Boston, MA 02108. 1991, 192 pp.

Cantwell, Alan, Jr., M.D. Queer Blood: The Secret AIDS Genocide Plot. Aries Rising Press, PO Box 29532, Los Angeles, CA 90029. 1993, 157 pp.
The author's third book on AIDS suggests its possible origin in the hepatitis experiments of the late Seventies and/or in other experiments "using Gays and Blacks as guinea pigs."

Carter, George M. ACT UP, The AIDS War & Activism. Open Magazine Pamphlet Series, P.O. Box 2726, Westfield, NJ 07091. 1992, 22 pp.
An examination of medical and political aspects of AIDS, critical of "corporate, high-tech" medicine and the "single-viral cause, 'magic-bullet cure' approach."

Caulfield, Charles R. and Billi Goldberg. The Anarchist AIDS Medical Formulary: A Guide to Guerilla Immunology. North Atlantic Books, P.O. Box 12327, Berkeley, CA 94701-9998. 1994, 155 pp.
A collection of columns from the San Francisco Sentinel dealing with various concerns, from the real meaning of CD-4 counts to the efficacy of vitamin supplements and experimental procedures (particularly the use of DNCB).

Chaitow, Leon. The Natural Way: HIV & AIDS. Element Books, 160 N. Washington St., Boston, MA 02114. 1999.
A guide to alternative treatments by a British naturopathic physician.

Chaitow, Leon and James Strohecker. You Don't Have to Die: Unravelling the AIDS Myth. Future Medicine Publishing, 21 1/2 Main St., Tiburon, CA 94920. 1994.
A guide to a variety of AIDS treatments and a critique of the HIV hypothesis. "Mandatory for the survival of persons with AIDS" - Jeremy Selvey, Founder of Project AIDS International.

Chan, Ching-Chee. An Alternative Approach to AIDS and Related Problems. Mississauga, Ontario, Egret Publications, 1992, 56 pp. No address indicated.
Maintains AIDS is caused by a modified version of Hansen's bacillus, linked to leprosy.

Clark, Hulda Regehr. The Cure for HIV and AIDS. ProMotion Publishing, 10387 Friars Rd., Suite 231, San Diego, CA 94120. 1993, 430 pp.
AIDS as a result of parasitic infestations and benzene poisoning.

Craven, B.M. and Gordon T. Stewart. AIDS in Africa: A Cautionary Tale. B.M. Craven, Newcastle Business School, University of Northumbria, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, England NE1 8ST. n.d., 19 pp.
A pamphlet exploring uncertainties about African AIDS, concluding that "there is some evidence that there is not a lethal pandemic of AIDS in Africa." The authors see AIDS outside Africa as "in most cases...a self-inflicted disease."

Day, Lorraine. AIDS: What the Government Isn't Telling You. Available from Second Opinion, PO Box 467939, Atlanta, GA 30346-7939, $22.95.

Dillard, Gavin. In the Flesh: Undressing for Success. Barricade Books, 150 Fifth Ave., New York, NY 10011.
Memoirs by the artist and poet dealing with his years as a male escort in Hollywood. Included is an account of his recovery from AIDS-related illnesses. " 'HIV test' has long been a moniker of confusion. People still die of AIDS who are HIV Negative, while others, like myself, have been positive for more than fifteen years and have the stamina of a tiger. I have known a number of young men who tested Positive, were coerced onto anti-viral medications, got sick from the medicines, and have even died. Who's being served here? Who's being duped? The HIV test is not only useless theology, it is a virulent trap for what has become a multi-billion-dollar death machine."

Dong, How Li, et al. AIDS: Spirits Share Understanding and Hope from the Other Side. Los Angeles, Spirit Speaks Press, PO Box 481286, Los Angeles, CA 90048 - 9773. 1986. 142 pp.

Duesberg, Peter H. (ed.) AIDS: Virus or Drug Induced? Kluwer Academic Publications, 101 Philip Dr., Norwell, MA 02061. 1996.
An anthology of 27 essays by leading dissident scholars, some reprinted from Genetica.

Duesberg, Peter H. Infectious AIDS: Have We Been Misled? North Atlantic Books, PO Box 12327, Berkeley, CA 94712. 1995, 582 pp. Preface by Richard C. Strohman.
A collection of thirteen important articles by the leading dissident AIDS scientist, originally published in scientific journals between 1987 and 1995 .

Duesberg, Peter H. Inventing the AIDS Virus. Regnery Publishing, 422 First St. SE, Suite 300, Washington, DC 20003. 1996, 722 pp. Foreword by Kary Mullis.
The pioneer AIDS dissident's summary of the history of AIDS, the reasons for the orthodox viral explanation and an outline of an alternative approach linking AIDS to drugs.

Duesberg, Peter and John Yiamouyiannis. AIDS: The Good News Is HIV Doesn't Cause It; The Bad News Is Recreational Drugs and Medical Treatments Like AZT Do. Health Action Press, 6439 Taggart Rd., Delaware, OH 43015. 1993.

Duke, Phillip S. The AIDS-ET Connection. The Author, 2503 S. 47th St., Omaha, NE 68106. Foreword by Roger Leir.
A thesis that HIV has been originated and spread by aliens. "Human abductions and cattle mutilations become logically understandable in terms of HIV," with alien-originated "implants" providing protection against the virus.

Dumke, Klaus. AIDS: The Deadly Seed. Rudolf Steiner Press, Box 955, Avon, England BS99 5QN.

Ellison, Bryan and Peter Duesberg. Why We Will Never Win the War on AIDS. Inside Story Communications, 190 El Cerrito Plaza, Suite 201, El Cerrito, CA 94530. 1994, 292 pp.
A comprehensive look at the AIDS story by leading skeptics of the HIV hypothesis. The authors examine other medical mistakes including SMON and pellagra, analyze the "war on cancer" as precursor to the AIDS establishment and critique the "fabricated epidemic" and its toxic treatments. A well-written exposé, suppressed because it was released by one of the co-authors (journalist Ellison) without the other's permission. Duesberg's own version was later published as Inventing the AIDS Virus.

Engelmajer, Lucien J. Drugs and AIDS: Realities, Symptomatology, Reflections. Le Patriarch, C/. Ruzafa, 38 - 46006 Valencia, Spain. 1991, 383 pp.
Engelmajer is the "patriarch" of a controversial European group (some call it a cult) operating centers for recovering drug addicts and others. He sees over-consumption of recreational and medical drugs as a main cause of AIDS. He outlines a comprehensive system of recovery, based on elimination of recreational drugs and a healthy lifestyle.

Engelmajer, Lucien J. The Duty to Stop Drugs and AIDS. The Patriarch, Inc., C/Ruzafa, 38, bajo, 46006 Valencia, Spain. n.d., 27 pp.

Epstein, Steven. Impure Science: AIDS, Activism, and the Politics of Knowledge. Berkeley, CA, University of California Press, 1997.

Farmer, Paul. AIDS and Accusation: Haiti and the Geography of Blame. Berkeley, University of California Press, 1992.

Fisher, Jeffrey A. The Plague Makers: How We Are Creating Catastrophic New Epidemics - and What We Must Do To Avert Them. Simon & Schuster, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020. 1994, 256 pp.
Various "serious infectious diseases...may soon reach epidemic proportions, plunging the world into a plague of misery and death unlike anything seen in over half a century." The author sees the main cause as the indiscriminate use of antibiotics, resulting in the emergence of antibiotic-resistant pathogens.

Fry, T.C. The Great AIDS Hoax. 3rd ed. Manacha, TX, Health Excellence Systems, 1989. 316 pages.

Fumento, Michael. The Myth of Heterosexual AIDS. Revised edition. Regnery Publishing, c/o Phillips Publishing International, 1 Massachusets Ave.N/W, 6th Flor, Washington, DC 20001.
See Vol. I for a review of the first edition.

Gasper, Jo Ann. What You Need to Know About AIDS. Ann Arbor, Servant Publications, PO Box 8617, Ann Arbor, MI 48107 - 8617. 1989. 174 pp.
A Reaganite attack on homosexuality and sex education.

Giraldo, Roberto A. AIDS and Stressors. Fundacion Arte Y Ciencia, Impresos Begon, calle 55 No. 42-18 Medellín, Colombia. 1997, 205 pp. Foreword by Ángel Galeano H.
"AIDS is neither an infectious disease nor is (it) sexually transmitted. It is a toxic-nutritional syndrome caused by the alarming worldwide increment of immunological stressor agents" both physical and mental. By a leading South American dissident, now resident in the U.S.

Goh, Magnolia and Tang Zhaoliang. Alternative Treatments for HIV Infection. Science Press, 84-04 58th Ave., Elmhurst, NY 11373. 1994, 247 pp.
An overview of alternative AIDS treatments, intended for the lay reader. The book begins with a condensation of conventional viral theory. Summaries of shiatsu, massage (with helpful illustrations), chiropractic, homeopathy and aromatherapy are excellent. The section on Traditional Chinese Medicine bogs down in details of herbs only obtainable by professionals, and favours particular trade-marked products. A basic concept of TCM - that each patient's unique constitution and requirements can only be treated with face-to-face consultation - is ignored. Among the addenda are a valuable list of alternative practitioners and clinics in the U.S. and a brief but thoughtful "Notes from a Long-Term Survivor" by Michael D. Anderson.

Goodfield, June. Quest for the Killers. Cambridge, MA, Birkhauser Boston, PO Box 2485, Secaucus, NJ 07094. 1985.
An examination of the hepatitis experiments of the late Seventies, which some believe may have helped trigger the AIDS epidemic.

Grace, Matthew. The Great $$$ AIDS Hoax. The Coalition for Health Re-education. Folded broadsheet, n.d. No address. Phone number: (212) 769-2489.

Green, Wayne. AIDS Info: A Whole New Approach to AIDS. Wayne Green, 70 N. 202, Peterborough NH 03458-1107. 1995, 16 pp.
A way of ridding the body of HIV by constructing an electrical "blood neutralizing device circuit".

Hallet, Michael (ed.) Activism and Marginalization in the AIDS Crisis. The Haworth Press, 10 Alice St., Binghamton, NY 13904-1580, 1997.
This critique of AIDS activism discusses how messages about AIDS and HIV are "produced and sustained through institutional mechanisms that survive institutional interests."

Haraway, Donna. Simians, Cyborgs and Women. Routledge, 7625 Empire Dr., Florence, KY 41042. 1991.
Includes a chapter "The Biopolitics of Postmodern Bodies: Constitutions of Self in Immune System Discourse."

Haverkos, Harry W. and John A. Dougherty. Health Hazards of Nitrite Inhalants. NIDA Research Monographs, National Institute on Drug Abuse, 5600 Fishers Lane, Rockville, MD 20857. 2nd printing, 1990, 112 pp.
No. 83 in the National Institute on Drug Abuse Monograph Series. A compendium of ten papers on the health hazards of inhaled nitrites ("poppers"). The authors feel that poppers' "association with KS and AIDS raises an important scientific question about possible synergistic reactions between viruses and chemicals in the development of cancer."

Heal, Achille S. and Dawn O. Lyfe. Airborne A.I.D.S. Threat? and the A.E.E. Theory for Finding Cures to Herpes and A.I.D.S. DGI Publishing, P.O. Box 702, Fallschurch, VA 22046. 1989, 240 pp.
This meandering treatise on insects as possible carriers of mutant HIV and herpes viruses explores such questions as "will HIV replicate in a zero-gravity environment?"

HEAL Comprehensive Information Packet: The Most Complete Information on "AIDS", Health, Therapy and Recovery. HEAL, Old Chelsea Station, PO Box 1103, New York, NY 10113. n.d., n.p.
A substantial book composed of bound, photocopied reproductions of important articles on the causes, nature and treatment of AIDS. Available for $18 (U.S.) from the address above.

Hodgkinson, Neville. AIDS: The Failure of Contemporary Science - How a Virus That Never Was Deceived the World. Fourth Estate, 6 Salem Road, London, W2 4BU, England. 1996, 420 pp.
As science correspondent of the London Sunday Times, the author wrote a series of dissident reports on AIDS. This book outlines his findings and views, unravels the conflicting theories and tells the stories of a number of important AIDS dissidents including Michael Callen, Jody Wells, Joseph Sonnabend and Peter Duesberg. One of the clearest and most comprehensive outlines of the whole AIDS controversy by a writer who understands both the scientific and the human aspects of the problem.

Hooper, Edward. The River: A Journey to the Source of HIV and AIDS. Little, Brown, 3 Center Plaza, Boxton, MA 02108 - 2084. 1999.
AIDS came from a stock of contaminated polio vaccine manufactured in the 1950's in Africa by Hilary Koprowski.

Horowitz, Leonard G. Deadly Innocence: Solving the Greatest Murder Mystery in the History of American Medicine. Tetrahedron, Inc., 10B Drumlin Rd., Rockport, MA 01966. 1994, 316 pp.
"Kimberly Bergalis was one of six innocent people intentionally infected with AIDS by a Florida dentist. This unbelievably [sic] true story unravels the mystery of Dr. Acer's compulsion and the government's efforts to hide the truth." The case of the demon dentist used as the basis of an alarmist warning about physician-to-patient transmission of AIDS.

Huang, Bing-shan (ed.) AIDS and Its Treatment by Traditional Chinese Medicine. Boulder, Blue Poppy Press, 3450 Penrose Pl., Suite 110, Boulder, CO 80301. 1991, 282 pp. Translated by Fu Di and Bob Flaws.

Irwin, Matthew. Can AZT & Other Anti-HIV Drugs Cause AIDS? HEAL (Toronto), 993 Queen St. East, Toronto, ON, Canada M4M 1K2. 16 pp.
"Are the toxic effects of anti-viral drugs being blamed on HIV?"

Irwin, Matthew. Problems With HIV Science. HEAL (Toronto), 993 Queen St. East, Toronto, ON, Canada M4M 1K2. 20 pp.
An examination of problems and contradictions of the HIV hypothesis.

James, John S. (ed.) AIDS Treatment News Volume 3: Issues 126 Through 189, May 1991 Through December, 1993. Alyson Publications, 40 Plympton St., Boston, MA 02118. 1994, 567 pp.
The third compilation of treatment evaluations from the journal AIDS Treatment News. Also includes some information about drug side-effects, poppers, etc.

Johnson, Hillary. Osler's Web: Inside the Labyrinth of the Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Epidemic. NY, Crown, c/o Random House, 201 E. 50 St., New York, NY 10022. 1996, 730 pages.
How Chronic Fatigue Syndrome grew as the CDC and NIH dismissed it and politics corrupted the scientific process.

Johnston, William I. HIV-Negative: How the Uninfected are Affected by AIDS. Insight Books, Plenum Publishing, 233 Spring St., New York, NY 10013-1578. 1995, 332 pp. Foreword by Eric Rofes.
An exploration of psychological and social issues affecting HIV Negative gay men ten years after the introduction of antibody testing. Illustrates the phenomenon of repeat testing ("Am I infected yet? Am I infected yet?") and the attractions of gaining HIV Positive status. A useful supplement to Odets and Rofes.

Jones, Colman. AIDS and Syphilis: What Is the Connection? The author, c/o Ideas, CBC Radio, Features Dept., PO Box 500, Station A, Toronto, ON, Canada M5W 1E6. 55 pages.
"Has the great masquerader made a deadly comeback?" A consideration of the possible role of syphilis in AIDS.

Kayal, Philip M. Bearing Witness: Gay Men's Health Crisis and the Politics of AIDS. Westview Press, 5500 Central Ave., Boulder, CO 80301-2877. 1993, 275 pp.
A history and assessment of the Gay Men's Health Crisis organization and its relationship to the politics of AIDS. Though not uncritical, it does not attempt to address Larry Kramer's question: "Are organizations like GMHC in any way like the Jewish councils set up during World War II to help the Germans exterminate them?"

Keith, Jim (ed.) Secret and Suppressed: Banned Ideas & Hidden History. Feral House, P.O. Box 3466, Portland, OR 97208. 1993, 315 pp.
An anthology of dissident views on a variety of subjects including mind control and media disinformation. G.J. Krupey's "AIDS: Act of God or the Pentagon?" explores the possibility of CIA-military involvement in the genesis of AIDS, quoting Department of Defence testimony on the proposed creation of immune-modulating micro-organisms, before a House Subcommittee in 1969.

Klusacek, Allan and Ken Morrison (eds.) A Leap in the Dark: AIDS Art and Contemporary Cultures. Vehicule Press, CP 125, Succ. Place du Parc, Montreal, QC H2W 2M9. 1992.

Konotey-Ahulu, Dr. F.I.D. What Is AIDS? Tetteh-A'Domeno Company, Watford, England. 1989, 227 pp.
Written by a Ghanaian physician, What Is AIDS? dispels some favourite myths (the green monkey, AIDS as a more serious African problem than malnutrition and war, genetic predisposition to AIDS) while restating others (AIDS as a result of "international prostitution"). The author is highly critical of the dumping of adulterated drugs, and discusses the misdiagnosis of various ailments as "AIDS."

Koob, Olav. The Deeper Aspects of AIDS. Rudolf Steiner School, Hood Manor, Darlington, Durham, England. n.d., 11 pp.
AIDS as a "dissolution of ego substance" allied to demonic possession and vampiric destruction. The author believes AIDS, like syphilis, involves the mixing of "European blood with exotic blood" and that homosexuality is a manifestation of the "weakening of life forces in (the) blood." A mixture of anthroposophically based speculation and racism. Translated from the German by Christopher Cooper.

Kramer, Larry. Reports from the Holocaust: The Story of an AIDS Activist. Updated and expanded edition. St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Ave., New York, NY 10010. 1994, 454 pp. Foreword by Simon Watney.
A much expanded version of the essay collection brings the work up to date from 1988 to 1993. Kramer's approach is often emotional and intuitive rather than intellectual or systematic. Passionate and provocative, he often says what others won't: "AIDS isn't a medical story. It's a political scandal, which science writers aren't capable of writing about...AIDS is intentional genocide."

Lambron, Evan C. AIDS: Scare or Scam? NY, Vantage Press, 516 W. 34 St., New York, NY 10001. 1994. 47 pages.

Lang, Serge. Challenges. Springer Verlag, PO Box 2485, Secaucus, NJ 07096 - 2485. 752 pp, 1998.
A collection of essays dealing with the conjunction of academic science, journalism and politics, including a discussion of scientific and journalistic standards and the nature of "expert" opinion. How is critical thinking promoted or inhibited? How and why are corrections obstructed? How do evasion, stonewalling and intimidation come into play? How are editorial and academic power used to suppress or marginalize dissident ideas and inconvenient data?

Lara, Martin J. Uropathy: The Most Powerful Holistic Therapy. Martin J. Lara, 599 Rogers Ave., Brooklyn, NY 11225-3807. 1995, 166 pp.
A treatise on the theory and methodology of uropathy (urine therapy) for the treatment of various diseases, including "AIDS and other apocalyptic plagues." A chapter on AIDS indicates familiarity with HEAL and with critiques of orthodox approaches.

Lauritsen, John. AIDS Epidemiology and Risk-Reduction Guidelines. Asklepios, 26 St. Marks Place, New York, NY 10003. 1990, 15 pp.
A gay activist's view of AIDS as a multi-causal syndrome. "Don't use drugs! And don't take AZT!"

Lauritsen, John. The AIDS War: Propaganda, Profiteering and Genocide from the Medical-Industrial Complex. Asklepios, 78 Bradford St., Provincetown, MA 02657. 1993, 480 pp.
A wide-ranging collection of articles by a research analyst, investigative reporter and leading dissident journalist, examining many aspects of the AIDS story. Duesberg, Nureyev, Kramer, poppers, AZT, AIDS conferences, holistic healing, recovery, propaganda and "HIV voodoo" are all lucidly covered.

Lauritsen, John and Ian Young (Eds.) The AIDS Cult: Essays on the Gay Health Crisis. Asklepios, Box 1902, Provincetown, MA 02657-0245. 1997, 224 pp.
An anthology of essays examing how beliefs, group interests and social forces conspire to make us "sick." Casper Schmidt's pioneering essay "The Group-Fantasy Origins of AIDS" is included, as well as a rare interview with Schmidt, considerations of long-term survival, and thoughts on the ideological and cultic aspects of the epidemic.

Maggiore, Christine. What If Everything You Thought You Knew About AIDS Was Wrong? The American Foundation for AIDS Alternatives, 11684 Ventura Blvd., Studio City, CA 91604. Fourth ed. revised. 1999, 127 pp.
The "little green book" - a brief but cogent critique of the HIV hypothesis and the orthodox view of AIDS by a leading dissident - has become a 127-page study. This most succinct summary to date of the fraying official line includes an exposé of problems with the HIV and viral load tests, the recommended treatments, the official view of an African epidemic, etc. Presented in bite-sized bits with good accompanying graphics, the latest revision includes testimonials from survivors, a guide to AIDS-speak, and tips for the newly diagnosed. The author, diagnosed HIV+, defied the authorities, became pregnant, and gave birth to a healthy baby.

McDougald, Michael. AIDS, Herbs and the Tridosha. Privately printed, 322 Rue Delinelle, Montreal, PQ, H4C 3E8. 1992, 55 pp.
Intended as a self-help guide, this booklet offers advice on medication, diet, meditation and daily routine, based on traditional Indian medicine.

McKeever, James, Ph.D. The AIDS Plague. Omega Publications, P.O. Box 4130, Medford, OR 97501. 1986, 191 pp.
This tract by a "megatrend analyst" and Bible historian combines AIDS orthodoxy (HIV as the single cause, African origins), alarmism (it may be spread via contaminated food), and religious exhortations. The author sees AIDS as "an incredible window of opportunity for the churches" to "regain the moral leadership of the nation." He advocates frequent HIV antibody tests for all Americans, the issuing of "AIDS health cards" in different colours to indicate health and antibody status, and the confinement of PWAs in "private facilities" resembling modern leper colonies. AIDS will take a high toll, but those with "high moral values" will survive, and there will be "a premium on marrying virgins." An example of right-wing Christian attitudes to AIDS.

McNamee, Brian F. and Lawrence J. McNamee. AIDS: The Nation's First Politically Protected Disease. La Habra, CA, National Medical Legal Publishing House, 1988. 182 pp.

Murphy, Timothy F. And Suzanne Poirier (eds.) Writing AIDS: Gay Literature, Language, and Analysis. Columbia University Press, 562 W. 113 St., New York, NY 10025. 1993, 352 pp.
A collection of intellectual and literary meditations including pieces on "The Language of War in AIDS Discourse," AIDS narratives on television, Black nationalism and homophobia, and the rhetoric of activism. Includes an excellent annotated bibliography by Franklin Brooks and co-editor Murphy.

Nelson, Emmanuel S. (ed.) AIDS: The Literary Response. Twayne Publishers, Macmillan Publishing Co., 866 Third Ave., New York, NY 10022. 1992, 233 pp.
An anthology of literary responses to AIDS, including essays on AIDS in novels, film and poetry, on Larry Kramer, Peter Cameron and Alice Hoffman and on "Gay Genocide as Literary Trope."

Odets, Walt. In the Shadow of the Epidemic: Being HIV-Negative in the Age of AIDS. Duke University Press, Box 90660, Durham, NC 27708-0660. 1995, 314 pp.
A thoughtful book by a clinical psychologist on the problems of HIV-Negative men. The author finds deep psychological disturbance in the gay community as a result of the AIDS epidemic: survivor guilt, disenfranchisement, emotional paralysis, sexual dysfunction, the avoidance of intimacy, a rise in the use of medicinal and recreational drugs, and the hypnotic pull of the disease itself. Particularly good on documenting the attractions of "the Positive lifestyle." "When there's a cure," says one man, "I'm going to have an enormous problem."

Ostrom, Neenyah. What Really Killed Gilda Radner? Frontline Reports on the Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Epidemic. That New Magazine, Inc., PO Box 1475, Church St. Station, New York, NY 10010. 1991, 392 pp.

Palmer, Susan. AIDS as an Apocalyptic Metaphor in North America. Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1997. 199 pp. A study of cultural attitudes to AIDS as exemplified by various political and religious groups, by the lives and works of several writers and artists, and by a variety of cultural phenomena from S/M to A Course in Miracles.

Peacott, Joe. Disinformation and Distortion - An Anarchist Exposé of AIDS Politics. BAD Press, c/o Joe Peacott, PO Box 1323, Cambridge, MA 02238. 1993, 64 pp.
A libertarian critique of AIDS politics and the AIDS establishment.

Penley, Constance and Andrew Ross (eds.) Technoculture. University of Minnesota Press, 111 Third Ave. S., Suite 290, Minneapolis, MN 55401 - 2520. 1991.
Includes "How to Have Theory in an Epidemic: The Evolution of AIDS Treatment Activism" by Paula Treichler.

Perrow, Charles and Mauro F. Guillén. The AIDS Disaster: The Failure of Organizations in New York and the Nation. Yale University Press, Box 209040, New Haven, CT 06520 - 9040. 1990, 206 pp.
A critique of organizational and governmental response to AIDS, concentrating on patterns of "denial, avoidance and segregation" as well as racial and sexual discrimination and other social injustices.

Preston, Richard. The Hot Zone. Random House, 400 Hahn Rd., Westminster, MD 21157. 1994, 300 pp.
The story of the breakout of "deadly African Ebola virus" from a research lab in suburban Washington, DC, and a consideration of the potentials for the spread of other "hot viruses."

Randall, R.C. Marijuana and AIDS: Pot, Politics and PWAs in America. Galen Press, PO Box 53318, Temple Heights Station, Washington, DC 20009. 1991, 183 pp. Foreword by Michael Aldrich.
An examination of marijuana's effect on the immune system, the use of marijuana to alleviate symptoms of AIDS and the "side-effects" of conventional treatments, as well as an indictment of U.S. drug policies. Includes the stories of a number of users of medical marijuana and their problems with government interference.

Reed, Paul. Back from the Brink: Reflections on Illness, Renewal, & Hope. House of Lillian, PO Box 14793, San Francisco, CA 94114. 1996, 23 pp.
Further notes of an AIDS survivor, a sequel to "The Savage Garden."

Reed, Paul. The Savage Garden: A Journal. House of Lillian, PO Box 14793, San Francisco, CA 94114. 1994, 166 pp.
Notes of an AIDS survivor.

Regush, Nicholas. The Virus Within: A Coming Epidemic. Viking, c/o Penguin Books Canada, 10 Alcorn Ave., Toronto, ON M4V 3B2. 2000, 261 pp..
A critique of orthodox AIDS science and a presentation of some possible alternative ideas. The work of independent scientists Dan Carrigan and Connie Knox is examined, particularly their discovery of a human herpes virus, HHV-6, in the blood of AIDS, MS and chronic fatigue patients.

Revolutionary Worker. AIDS and Repression in Pre-War America: Reprints from the Revolutionary Worker. Revolutionary Worker, Box 3486, Merchandise Mart, Chicago, IL 60654. 1987, 11 pp.
A critique of U.S. AIDS policies, concentrating on abuses of civil rights.

Revolutionary Worker. The American Response to AIDS - A Pogrom Waiting to Happen. Revolution Books, 13 East 16 St., New York, NY 10003. [1987], 17 pp.
A selection of articles from the Revolutionary Worker, organ of the Revolutionary Communist Party, which regards homosexuality as "a concentration of bourgeois ideology." A mixture of orthodox science and scattergun social criticism.

Rofes, Eric. Reviving the Tribe: Regenerating Gay Men's Sexuality and Culture in the Ongoing Epidemic. Harrington Park Press, 10 Alice St., Binghamton, NY 13904-1580. 1996, 318 pp.
An insightful look into the problems of the gay community after almost two decades of AIDS. The author, a former worker in a mainstream AIDS organization, sees the epidemic as leaving a psychological as well as a medical disaster, a "mass psychic numbing" that has generated its own rituals and psychological expectations. The book stops short of any radical critique of AIDS orthodoxy and ignores the dissident movement.

Root-Bernstein, Robert. Rethinking AIDS: The Tragic Cost of Premature Consensus. The Free Press, 866 Third Ave., New York, N.Y., 10022. 1993, 512 pp.
An extensive and meticulous study of AIDS and AIDS research, including instances of AIDS before the official beginning of the epidemic. The author is skeptical about HIV as a causal agent, especially in transfusion and Factor VIII cases, and feels multiple causes of immune suppression often precede HIV infection. Extensively footnoted.

Rotello, Gabriel. Sexual Ecology: AIDS and the Destiny of Gay Men. Dutton, Penguin Books, 375 Hudson St., New York, NY 10014. 1997, 320 pp.
HIV as one of a number of factors that led to the epidemic, many of them "built right into the fabric of urban gay life after Stonewall." A premise of the book is that "all diseases are ecological."

Ryan, Mary Kay and Arthur D. Shattuck. Treating AIDS With Chinese Medicine. Pacific View Press, P.O. Box 2657, Berkeley, CA 94702. 1994, 364 pp.
A guide to understanding and treating AIDS with Traditional Chinese Medicine by professionals working in the North Side HIV Treatment Center in Chicago. It outlines the TCM approach to AIDS, comparing and contrasting it with orthodox Western methods. The approach is clear and detailed and evolves from actual practice. Aimed at both professionals and the general reader, this is probably the best of the books dealing with AIDS and TCM.

Selvey, Jeremy F. And Mark L. Alampi. The Secrets Behind HIV & AIDS: Causes, Cures, Contradictions & Conspiracies. RJFSR, 8033 Sunset Blvd., Suite 2640, Los Angeles, CA 90046.

Sergios, Paul A. One Boy at War: My Life in the AIDS Underground. Alfred A. Knopf, 400 Hahn Rd., Westminster, MD 21157. 1993, 388 pp.
The story of one man's quest through "the AIDS underground" in search of an effective treatment. An unbiased look at a number of organizations, institutions and therapies, including ACT UP, Louise L. Hay's "Hayrides," the Compound Q trials, ozone therapy, the Names Project quilt and cross-border drug smuggling.

Shenton, Joan. Positively False. I.B. Tauris & Co., Victoria House, Bloomsbury Square, London, England WC1B 4D2. 1998. 277 pp.
A British-based overview of the AIDS story by a prize-winning medical journalist and producer of several films exploring dissident views of AIDS. Includes material on the author's experiences in attempting to publicize unorthodox views and an chapter asking "Does HIV Exist?"

Showalter, Elaine. Hystories: Hysterical Epidemics and Modern Media. Columbia University Press, 61 W. 62 St., New York, NY 10023. 1997, 224 pp.
An interpretation of a number of contemporary phenomena as collaborative constructions of physicians, mental health professionals, confused patients and the media, and spread by self-help books, talk shows, films and the Internet. The phenomena considered are satanic ritual abuse, alien abductions, Gulf War Syndrome, recovered memories, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and multiple personalities. A controversial addition to the history of group fantasies and mass hysteria.

Siegal, Frederick P. And Marta Siegal. AIDS: The Medical Mystery. Grove Press, 196 West Houston St., New York, NY 10014. 1983, 269 pp.

Understanding AIDS: A Political Perspective on the Crisis. World View Forum, Inc., 46 West 21 St., New York, NY 10010. 1987, 18 pp.
A critique of U.S. AIDS policies from a perspective of anti-racism and "workers' struggle." Suggests AIDS may possibly originate in U.S. biowarfare laboratories.

Vaucher, Andrea R. Muses From Chaos and Ash: AIDS, Artists, and Art. Grove Press, 841 Broadway, New York, NY 10003-4793. 1993, 260 pp.
A compendium of (mostly brief) statements on various aspects of the AIDS crisis from a variety of artists working in different disciplines.

Verghese, Abraham. My Own Country. Simon & Schuster. 100 Front St., Riverside, NJ 08075.

Walker, Martin J. Dirty Medicine: Science, Big Business and the Assault on Natural Health Care. Slingshot Publications, BM Box 8314, London, England WC1N 3XX. Revised edition, 1994, 733 pp.
A wide-ranging indictment of the orthodox medical establishment (particularly in Britain) and its war on holistic and alternative medicine. Though the blurb describes the book as "a frightening story of the free market," it actually shows how big business and the medical science establishment have used government regulations and restrictions to "defend their products and profits from competition." Much of the book deals with the AIDS story, viewing it as part of a much larger picture. Long and prolix, but full of useful background information.

Why Question HIV & AIDS? HEAL Toronto, 993 Queen St. E., Toronto, ON, Canada M4M 1K2. 1999, 16 pp.
A pamphlet issued by the Toronto chapter of HEAL, providing a summary of flaws in the HIV/AIDS hypothesis.

Willner, Robert E. Deadly Deception: The Proof That Sex and HIV Absolutely Do Not Cause AIDS. Peltec Publishing Co., 4400 North Federal Highway, Suite 210, Boca Raton, FL 33431. 1994, 266 pp.
A physician's challenge to AIDS orthodoxy, including recommendations for holistic therapies and critiques of the HIV hypothesis and conventional treatments. Written in a sensationalistic style with lots of boldface and capitalizations. The author dramatized his disagreement with the HIV hypothesis by publicly injecting himself with blood from an HIV Positive person. (He died - of an unrelated heart attack.)

Wilson, Hank. Poppers (Nitrite Inhalants) and HIV: Immunosuppression, Seroconversion, Unsafe Sex. ACT-Up Golden Gate, 1651 Market St., San Francisco, CA 94103. 24 pages.
A compendium and review of scientific papers.

Woinarowicz, David. Close to the Knives: A Memoir of Disintegration. Vintage Books, 201 E. 50th St., New York, NY 10022. 1991, 276 pp.
A collection of harrowing essays and diatribes by an artist and sometime hustler "woken up" by the AIDS epidemic. Loneliness, rage and a highly personal look at America in the age of AIDS.

Women's Health Interaction Collective. Uncommon Questions: A Feminist Exploration of AIDS. Women's Health Interaction, 58 Arthur St., Ottawa, ON, Canada K1R 7B9, 1999, 38 pp.
A feminist examination of various AIDS controversies, including the existence of HIV, the veracity of testing, the question of "HIV in breast milk," drug toxicities and policy questions.

Woods, Chris. State of the Queer Nation: A Critique of Gay and Lesbian Politics in 1990s Britain. Cassell, Wellington House, 1256 Strand, London WC2R OBB, England. 1995, 60 pp.

Workers World Party. Understanding AIDS: A Political Perspective on the Crisis. Workers World Library, World View Forum, Inc., 46 West 21 St., New York, NY 10010. 1987, 18 pp.

Young, Ian. The Stonewall Experiment: A Gay Psychohistory. Cassell, Wellington House, 125 Strand, London WC2R OBB, England. 1995, 312 pp.
This psychohistorical study of gay men from the 1880's to the present explores how we got from Stonewall to AIDS in just twelve years. Gay self-images, motivations, behaviours and belief systems are examined in the context of contemporary culture, with illustrative material taken from films, street poetry, advertising, political polemics and novels. Some classic and neglected works of gay literature are reconsidered in a new light as prophetic texts.

Zhang, Quingcai, M.D. Compound Q: Tricosanthin and Its Clinical Applications. Oriental Arts Institute, 1945 Palo Verde Ave., Suite 208, Long Beach, CA 90815. 1990, 160 pp. Edited by Heidi Ziolkowski.
A rather jumbled mishmash of Traditional Chinese and orthodox Western approaches, together with some herbal suggestions. Lots of quasi-formulas, charts and tables. The authors' TCM credentials are dubious and they present little clinical experience, validated references or documentation.

Zhong Dajin, et al. Treatment of AIDS with Traditional Chinese Medicine. Shandong Science and Technology Press. Order from China Books & Periodicals, 2929 24th St., San Francisco, CA 94110.

HIV Deprogramming. The Catalog of Forbidden Knowledge. RJFSR Trust, 8033 Sunet Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90046. "For those who do not believe in HIV, but still wish to quell the subconscious conflict of consensus over science. Ultimately, this removes as well as dispels the HIV voodoo death sentence."

Johnson, Phil, Charles Thomas and Robert Maver. Rethinking AIDS Interviews Phil Johnson, Ll.D., Chas. Thomas, Ph.D. and Robt. Maver, F.A.A., M.A. Rethinking AIDS, 1993.

Acting Up in the USA. Positive Nation, No. 6, April, 1996. "ACT UP member Michael DeHart was shoved to the ground and dragged into the hallway by conference organizers and volunteers."

Anderson, Mark K. Sick of It All: A Vigilant - and much vilified - band of dissidents decries the HIV=AIDS=death mythology. Fairfield County Weekly (Stamford, CT), Jan. 20 - Feb. 4, 1998, p. 12. Christine Maggiore and HEAL.

Baumgartner, Michael. To AIDS-activism - Thanks for Nothing! Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 2, July-Aug. 1996. A critical overview of AIDS activism in the gay community.

Beswick, Terry. SPITTer Spews Sputum to Protest "Genocide". Bay Times, 5 Sept., 1996. Check date.

Callen, Michael. The Finale. Genre, Feb./March 1994. The leading AIDS dissident's final piece before his death summarizes AIDS activism and controversies. "I didn't believe that you could build a revolution on anything but truth."

Corbett, Kevin. Beyond 'Self-Help': Developing a Social Movement to Defeat Medical Orthodoxy and Dismantle 'AIDS'. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 3, Spring, 1998.

Cottrell calls off GAG campaign from prison. Capital Gay (London), July 8, 1994, p. 3.

Denenberg, Risa. Lesbian AIDS Activists: What Are We Doing? Out Week, Oct. 15, 1989.

Farber, Celia. AIDS: Words from the Front. When AIDS provocateur Larry Kramer hobnobbed with establishment honcho Anthony Fauci, ACT UP decided it was time to act out. SPIN, Vol. 11, No. 6, Sept., 1995, p. 103.

Farber, Celia. The Outsiders. Spin, Vol. 12, No. 11, Feb. 1997. Profile of HEAL.

GAG Duo sent to prison. Capital Gay (London), 1994 (exact date uncertain). Two gay men imprisoned for their campaign against Burroughs-Wellcome's AIDS drugs.

Gilbert, Sky. AIDS Dissidents Wage Lonely Battle. Globe & Mail, Oct. 13, 1998. P. D5. A profile of HEAL (Toronto).

Kingston, Tim. Acting Up or Acting Out? Is ACT UP/SF about justice...or just about self-justification? SF Frontiers, April 11, 1996.

Lauritsen, John. Dissent at the Berlin AIDS Conference. Rethinking AIDS, Vol. I, No. 7, July 1993, p. 2. Censorship and organized vandalism against dissidents.

Nichols, Mark. Rethinking AIDS: A Growing Lobby Challenges the HIV Connection. Macleans, April 12, 1999.

AZT

Altman, Lawrence K. New study questions use of AZT in early treatment of AIDS. New York Times, April 2, 1993.

AZT for Pregnant HIV+ Women and Their Newborns. Reappraising AIDS, Vol. 5, No. 2, Feb. 1997.

Chiu, D.T. and Peter H. Duesberg. The Toxicity of Azidothymidine (AZT) on Human and Animal Cells in Culture at Concentrations Used for Antiviral Therapy. Genetica, Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, 1995.

Farber, Celia. AZT made a public relations comeback last year, after a new study declared its effectiveness in halting the transmission of HIV from mother to child. But how accurate was the data? And what is the long-term risk to both mother and child? SPIN, Vol. 11, No. 1, April, 1995.

Farber, Celia. AZT on Trial. The treatment for AIDS stands accused of being deadlier than the disease itself. SPIN, July, 1996.

Farber, Celia. AZT Roulette. Mothering, Sept.-Oct. 1998. Questions surrounding HIV Positive women, testing and AZT.

Farber, Celia. Rage Against the AIDS Machine: Now that the Concorde Study Has Proven AZT is a Failure, A New Breed of Activists Are Lashing Out at the Drug's Manufacturer, Burroughs Wellcome, and at the AIDS Organizations They Feel Betrayed Them. SPIN, Oct., 1993, p. 95.

Hand, Tim. Why antiviral drugs cannot resolve AIDS. Reappraising AIDS, Vol. 4, No. 9, Sept., 1996. By an associate professor of neuroscience and endocrinology who has been a "healthy HIV Positive" for over twelve years.

King, Edward. Concorde trial casts doubt on early use of AZT. Gay Times, May 1993.

Lauritsen, John. Petrushka was poisoned. New York Native, Feb. 1, 1993. Did AZT contribute to Nureyev's untimely death?

Mayhew, Clemmer, III. AZT wizard: The trials and transformations of Dr. Fischl. New York Native, Sept. 13, 1993. An examination of the career of Dr. Margaret Ann Fischl, director of the Center for Disease Control's AIDS Clinical Research Unit.

Ostrom, Neenyah. American authorities in uproar over European AZT trial results. New York Native, April 19, 1993. "Despite lack of positive findings, recommendations from U.S. on 'early intervention' remain unchanged."

Ostrom, Neenyah. AZT Disease: Doctor cautions that thousands may die due to toxic drug. New York Native, Oct. 2, 1989.

Ostrom, Neenyah. Nightmare on AZT Street. New York Native, Sept. 4, 1995. An Asian study detailing birth defects - extra fingers, misplaced ears, misshapen faces, abnormal pigmentation, neurological problems, heart defects, and more - found in babies born to pregnant women who take AZT.

Ostrom, Neenyah. The poisoning continues: Pregnant women with 'AIDS' to be given AZT. New York Native, July 31, 1989.

Ostrom, Neenyah. Profiles in Courage. New York Native, Dec. 19, 1994. An overview of AZT and its critics.

Rogers, Patrick. A Mother's Instinct: A Maine Court Affirms Valerie Emerson's Right to Keep Her Little Boy Off AZT. People, 5 Nov., 1998.

Strange, Mike. AIDS: Exploring Divisions, Looking for Unity. Continuum, Vol. 1, No. 4, June/July, 1993. A homoeopath's view of AIDS and AZT.

Waller, James. AZT causes cancer in lab rats and mice. Out Week, Dec. 17, 1989.

Wells, Jody. AZT and the Newborn Child. Continuum, Vol. 2, No. 1, Feb.-Mar. 1994.

Zaretsky, M.D. AZT Toxicity and AIDS Prophylaxis: Is AZT Beneficial for HIV+ Asymptomatic Persons with 500 or More T4 Cells per Cubic Millimeter? Genetica, Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, 1995.

Blood Testing and Screening

D'Eramo, James E. HIV antibody testing: debate or obsessive diversion? New York Native, Aug. 14, 1989.

Edwards, Nigel. Have Thousands Been Wrongly Diagnosed HIV+? The Big Issue Weekly, No. 187, June 24-30, 1996. "The abuses of individual human rights arising from bad science and medical coercion around HIV testing are profound."

Farber, Celia. With the First HIV Test in 1985, Doctors Thought They Had Discovered an Absolute Oracle: Will the Patient Live or Die? Celia Farber Reports on a Recent Controversial Scientific Paper That Says the So-called AIDS Test is Too Flawed to be Reliable. SPIN, Nov. 1993, p. 123.

Gilmore, Monica. Consequences of Ritual Testing. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 6, Summer, 1999.

HIV Positive? It Depends Where You Live. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 4, Nov.-Dec. 1995. Criteria for the Western Blot test vary from country to country.

Hodgkinson, Neville. New Doubts Over AIDS Infection As HIV Test Declared Invalid. Sunday Times (London), Aug. 1, 1993. Report on Australian criticism of the validity of HIV antibody testing.

Johnson, Christine. Viral Load and the PCR - Why They Can't Be Used to Prove HIV Infection. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 4, Nov.-Dec. 1996.

Johnson, Christine. Whose Antibodies Are They Anyway? Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 3, 1996. How accurate are HIV antibody tests? Provides a list of many conditions from the scientific literature that may give "false positive" results.

Osborne, Duncan. AZT maker to promote HIV testing in gay ad blitz. Out Week, April 11, 1990.

Outlaw 'HIV' Testing: Refuse & Resist. Death Camp (London), No. 19, Jan. 1998. "Thousands would be alive today had the fake 'HIV' tests not been invented."

Papadopulos-Eleopulos, Eleni, Valendar F. Turner and John M. Papadimitriou. Is a Positive Western Blot Proof of HIV Infection? Bio/Technology, Vol. 11, June 1993, pp. 696-707.

Philpott, Paul and Christine Johnson. Viral Load of Crap. Reppraising AIDS, Vol. 4, No. 10, Oct., 1996. A critique of "viral load" testing.

Sayers, M.H., P.G. Beatty & J.A. Hanson. HLA Antibodies are a cause of false positive reactions in screening enzyme immunoassays for antibodies to HTLV-III. Transfusion 26, 1986, p. 113.

Teeman, Tim. And the Test's History. The Pink Paper, Dec. 1997. Questions about the HIV antibody tests.

Turner, Valendar F. Do Antibody Tests Prove HIV(TM) Infection? Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 2, Winter, 1997-8. An interview by Huw Christie.

Turner, Valendar F. Testing, Testing 123. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 5, Jan.-Feb. 1996. HIV antibody tests do not prove HIV infection.

Verney-Elliott, Michael. 'Virtual Viral Load' Tests. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 5, Midwinter, 1998-9. A critique of 'viral load' testing.

Young, Ian. Testing, Testing: A Look at Our Most Popular Ritual. Icon (Toronto), March 1997. HIV-antibody testing as a ritualistic rite of passage in the gay community, and its psychological effects.

Cultural Issues and the Media

Andriette, Bill. AIDS in the Popular Mind. The Guide, August, 1991. Four activists look at how HIV is affecting sex, culture and politics.

Baumgartner, Michael. The Gay Community's Need for 'HIV'. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 1, May-June 1996. The need gay men had to believe in a single cause of illness instead of examining their unaccepted lifestyle. By a gay former AIDS chaplain at San Francisco General Hospital.

Bell, Gregory Boyd. Truth and Advertising: Are Pharmaceutical Ads Compromising Medical Journals? Eye (Toronto), Oct. 28, 1999.

Blood Line: HIV-Negative 'Pride' for Sale. The Guide, June 1992. A firm sells cards that certify the bearer is HIV Negative.

Christie, Huw. Unfounded Assertions. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 4, Nov-Dec, 1996. An analysis of attacks by The Observer newspaper on Neville Hodgkinson's critiques of AIDS orthodoxy.

Decter, Midge. Dying of the Light. National Review, Nov. 27, 1995. "For a long time, gay rights activists have divided their time between...declaring that everyone, homosexual or heterosexual, is equally at risk of contracting AIDS, and, on the other hand, demanding special attention and compassion as a community uniquely victimized by it."

Edwards, Nigel. HIV Watch: An Eye on the Media. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 6, Mar-April 1996. Former acting editor of Britain's Pink Paper reports on being fired for covering AIDS controversies. "These people were being effectively censored by the media, gay and straight alike...Where is the unbiased, open-minded and critical journalism there is in other fields?"

Farber, Celia. Doing the Math. SPIN, Vol. 12, No. 5, August, 1996. The mainstream media calls off the heterosexual AIDS scare. Celia Farber wonders what took so long.

Foster, R. Daniel. Shopping for Life. The Advocate, Nov. 28, 1995. "For some, AIDS is no longer a disease - it's a T-shirt."

France, David. Wheels of Fortune. Out, Oct. 1997. "One Dan Pallotta inspires cyclists to bust their butts and raise giant sums to fight AIDS. The other is tarred by critics as a cultish profiteer."

Harris, Daniel. Making Kitsch from AIDS: A Disease With a Gift Shop of Its Own. Harper's, July, 1994, p. 55. A critique of the Names Project Quilt and AIDS-related products.

'HIV Belief' as a Totalitarian Movement. Death Camp, No. 10, Mar-Apr. 1996.

Istel, John. HIV-Negative. New York, Feb. 10, 1997. Obituary for the New York Native. 'I think that there are people who are not infected with the virus but who AIDS nevertheless destroys. Chuck [Ortleb, Native publisher] was one of those,' says Larry Kramer.

Lang, Serge. HIV and AIDS: Questions of Scientific and Journalistic Responsibility. Yale Scientific, Fall 1994, pp. 8 - 23; Winter 1995, pp. 15 - 21. Check.

Mason, Kiki. Dating and HIV. Out, Feb./March, 1994, p. 132. "The most novel approach comes from a friend who recently tattooed on his left arm a black plus sign with the letters HIV in white inside of it. 'It's a form of shock therapy,' he says, 'but it separates the men from the boys, as it were'."

Paglia, Camille. Counterculture. Continuum, Vol. 4, no. 2, July-Aug. 1996. In an interview with Huw Christie, Paglia analyses the cultural underpinnings of the AIDS crisis.

Philpott, Paul. Partying Turkeys to Preach Brazil AIDS Awareness. Reappraising AIDS, Vol. 5, No. 7, Sept.-Oct. 1997. Chickens, watermelons and balloons as AIDS education devices.

Russell, Alex. Activating an Alternative Anti-AIDS Archive. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 6, Summer, 1999. A report on disputes in the press.

Russell, Alex. AIDS-related Kitsch. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 1, May-June 1996. An analysis of sentimental excesses of the AIDS culture.

Russell, Alex. The HIV(TM) Haute Couture Habitus. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 3, Spring, 1998. Commodity fetishism and the consumer culture of AIDS

Shioya, Tara. Tales of the Circuit. San Francisco Weekly, May 13, 1998. "A continent-spanning series of huge, controversial, dance-filled and drug-doused 'circuit parties' for gay men."

Simmons, Todd. The Glamorization of AIDS. The Advocate, Nov. 28, 1995. "Everywhere you look, the media send the message 'It's sexy to be HIV-positive'."

Suhanic, Gigi. Struggling to Find Meaning. Xtra! (Toronto), May 21, 1998. "Death is just a little too easy for gay men now." A gay doctor pleads guilty to aiding the suicides of HIV+ gay men.

Walker, Martin. Truth about AIDS censorship. The Observer, April 24, 1994.

Experimental Therapies and Techniques

Alcorn, Keith. Complementary therapies - what are the alternatives? Capital Gay, April 1, 1994. "The National AIDS Manual now lists more than fifty centres and support groups in the U.K. offering over thirty different complementary therapies."

Bent, Robert. The Swiss Connection. New York Native, Oct. 21, 1991. Treatment involving blood ionization and plant extracts.

Blaun, Randi. Insurance Against AIDS? New York, June 3, 1985. Report on isoprinosine.

Calvieri, Stafano and Andrea Fattotossi. Cimetidine for Kaposi's Sarcoma. Clinical and Experimental Dermatology, Vol. 10, 1985, pp. 499 - 501.

Christie, Huw. Acyclovir. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 4, Nov.-Dec. 1995. "The reported spectre of variant herpes viruses that have developed resistance to acyclovir - and which in 'HIV+' people are subsequently suppressed with highly toxic foscarnet - should be enough to make anybody seriously question the necessity for this drug in their lives, and to explore better options."

Christie, Huw. DuanoXome. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 5, Jan.-Feb. 1996. "A variety of effective long-term treatments for KS have been shown, but DuanoXome is not one of them."

Clark, Matt with Fred Coleman et al. AIDS Exiles in Paris. Newsweek, Aug. 5, 1985. Americans in Paris trying experimental treatments.

DNCB Treatment Instructions 11/18/93. Bulletin issued by DNCB Treatment Issues, 2261 Market St., #499, San Francisco, CA 94114.

Gene Manipulation Discussed at AIDS Conference. Globe and Mail, Aug. 11, 1994, p. A-8.

Gilden, Dave. Adverse Events. POZ, April 2000. "A shocking series of clinical-trial deaths red-flags the perils of quick-and-dirty development....The lodenosine scandal should give us all pause. Above all, it is a wake-up call to HIVers not to trust companies to provide complete, objective information about dangers."

Harrington, Mark. Jump-starting the Immune System: Vaccines and Seropositive Individuals. Outweek, Oct. 31, 1990. Vaccine trials by Jonas Salk and others.

Hitchens, Christopher. Forging the Magic Bullet. Vanity Fair, Nov. 1993, p. 42. DAB 389 IL-2 (IL-2 fusion toxin): genetically engineered bacteria.

James, Gareth. The DNCB Files. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 3, Sept.-Oct. 1998. "DNCB supports and strengthens cell-mediated immunity."

Jones, Colman. Purifying the blood products uused by hemophiliacs with HIV seems to prevent them from getting AIDS... Spin, Vol. 10, No. 7, Oct. 1994. "One of the most effective treatment strategies ever."

McCabe, Ed. Oxygen Therapy: Medical Ozone Therapies - 50 Years of Overlooking a Proven Answer for Diseases like Cancer and now AIDS. Vitality (Toronto), October, 1993, p. 6. Reports of over 300 AIDS patients brought to HIV negative status, with health stabilization. "It is my opinion that the AIDS problem has been solved."

Mirken, Bruce. What Ever Happened to Compound Q? The Guide, May, 1992. The history of a once-promising treatment.

Ostrom, Neenyah. A new tactic against KS. New York Native, Oct. 9, 1995. Interview with Dr. Alvin Friedman-Kien about treatment of KS with foscarnet.

Researchers Reinforce AIDS-drug Test. Globe & Mail, Oct. 31, 1996. Report on treatment with Interleukin-2.

Reticulose. AIDS Therapies, Jan. 7, 1991. "A mixture of bovine serum albumin, peptones and ribonucleic acid."

Stolberg, Sheryl Gay. Thirty-seven years later, a second chance for thalidomide. New York Times, Sept. 23, 1997. Thalidomide for AIDS and other illnesses.

Zachary, Bohdan. Nonoxynol-9: Better Safe Than Sorry? Out, Feb./March, 1994, p. 126. "Will nonoxynol-9 increase your risk for HIV instead of protecting you?"

General

AIDS Conference Lives Up to Somber Expectations. Globe and Mail, Aug. 12, 1994, p. A-9. Bleak prospects and admissions of failure from the AIDS establishment.

An Urgent Appeal for Action. New York Native, April 5, 1993. A paper presented to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights by International Development, Inc. and Project AIDS International, on flaws and errors in orthodox AIDS diagnosis and treatment.

Ankomah, Baffour. Aids 'Gadflies' Bite the Establishment. New Africa, No. 323, Oct. 1994.

Ankomah, Baffour. AIDS: The Deadly Deception Exposed. New African, Sept. 1996. On various AIDS controversies, and on AIDS dissident Neville Hodgkinson.

Ankomah, Baffour. AIDS - Why African Successes Are Scoffed. New African, Sept. 1996.

Barr, Mike. How to Get There From Here. POZ, Oct. 1999. Interview with Dr. Steven Miles of UCLA. "From a drug developer's standpoint, AIDS is now the most attractive disease on the earth...The drugs are very expensive,,,and don't cure anybody...You have pharmaceutical firms that, before their drug is even on the market, target the activist groups."

Beral, V., D. Bull, S. Darby et al. Risks of Kaposi's sarcoma and sexual practices associated with fecal contact in homosexual or bisexual men with AIDS. Lancet 339, 1992, p. 632.

Berkowitz, Richard. The Most Dangerous AIDS Reporter. POZ, April, 2000. Interview with Celia Farber.

Biser, Sam. If You Plan to Have Fun This Week, Better Read This First. Advanced Natural Therapies, Vol. 2, No. 9, 1992, p. 1. An interview with Dr. Lorraine Day. A series of alarmist warnings, i.e. AIDS can be transmitted through kissing; AIDS blood is "actively recruited" and may end up in your veins," etc. "I will paint you a kaleidoscope of horror."

Biser, Sam. The Government Is Lying About AIDS - Just Like They've Lied About a Lot of Other Things. The Last Chance Health Report, Vol. 3, No. 1, 1992. "A nosebleed from an HIV-positive person can carry enough virus to kill a medium-sized town...Eating in restaurants is a risk...The government is also lying about the dangers from restaurants, swimming pools and mosquitos."

Byrnes, Stephen C. Benzene, Lubricants and AIDS. Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients, April, 1998. Dangers of benzene in lubricants and lubricated condoms.

Callen, Michael. Sonnabend's Last Round. QW, Oct. 11, 1992. An interview with the dissident AIDS physician.

Christie, Huw. Pentamidine. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 3, Sept.-Oct. 1995. "Research suggests the drug destroys natural immunity in the lungs."

Cohen, Jon. Uninfectable. New Yorker, July 6, 1998. Why do some people seem to be naturally "immune"?

Conlan, Mark Gabrish. Controversial Warrior of 'The AIDS War'. Gay & Lesbian Times, Aug. 19, 1993, p. 28. Interview with John Lauritsen.

Dahir, Mubarak. Under False Pretenses. The Advocate, May 16, 1995. "Some participants in AIDS drug trials will do anything to stay alive, even if it means falsifying study results."

Drinking Beer Stops AIDS Progression. Positive Health News, No. 12, Fall, 1996.

Ellner, Michael. Choosing a Doctor in the Age of AIDS? Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 1, Autumn 1997.

Ellner, Michael. Tricked Again! Political Visions and Latex Law Suits in New York. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 3, Spring, 1998. Questions about the utility of condom use and a critique of the use of gay men to test antibiotics.

Farber, Celia. AIDS & South Africa: A Contrary Conference in Pretoria. New York Press, Vol. 13, No. 21, May 24 - 30, 2000. A report on the 2000 AIDS conference in Pretoria to which President Mbeki invited dissident scientists and reporters.

Farber, Celia. AIDS, Inc.: Observations of an AIDS Dissident. Continuum, Vol. 2, No. 4, Aug.-Sept. 1994. "AIDS-think specifies that anybody who questions HIV's power is dangerous and irresponsible."

Farber, Celia. Back up a minute... Spin, Vol. 10, No. 9, Dec. 1994. A summary of the year's events.

Farber, Celia. Kary Mullis... Spin, Vol. 10, No. 4, July 1994. An article on the Nobel Prize winner and AIDS dissident.

Farber, Celia. Quietly, the government has reduced by one third its original estimate of how many people are infected with HIV... Spin, Vol. 11, No. 4, July 1995. A look at "statistical hysteria."

Farber, Celia. Twelve Months Ago, Scientists Claimed They Had a Reliable Test, Effective Medicine, and an Ironclad Theory for AIDS. With the HIV Test Revealed as Flawed, AZT Deemed Useless, and the HIV Dogma Unravelding, 1993 Has Been a Turning Point. SPIN, Jan., 1994, p. 71.

Gearhart, Sally Miller. Animal Research and AIDS: Ethics and Effectiveness. Gay Community News, April 10-16, 1988.

Genetic Link Seen in HIV Immunity. Globe & Mail, Oct. 20, 1993, p. A15. A study suggesting possible natural immunity to HIV in some Kenyan women.

Geshekter, Charles L. Myths of AIDS and Sex. Sacramento Bee, Oct. 30, 1994.

Giese, Rachel. A Very Sick Business. This Magazine, Aug. 1994, p. 24. "Canadians with AIDS are being forced to sell their life insurance to U.S. Deathbrokers...Viatical companies are ruthless. They call people, who are sick and desperate and broke, all hours of the night and day and pressure them and don't stop until they've made a sale."

Giraldo, Roberto A., Michael Ellner, Celia Farber, et al. Is It Rational to Treat or Prevent AIDS With Toxic Anti-Retroviral Drugs in Pregnant Women, Infants, Children, and Anybody Else? Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 6, Summer, 1999.

Goudreau, Mike. Blood Feud. Spin, Vol. 12, No. 12, March 1997. The ethics of animal research and "the open hatred between AIDS activists and animal-rights advocates."

Haller, Scott. An Angry New York Doctor Turns South-of-the Border Smuggler to Treat Patients in Danger of AIDS. People, Oct. 14, 1985.

Hammond, John, Neenyah Ostrom and Tom Steele. New York Native 1980 - 1995. New York Native, No. 660, Dec. 11, 1995. A summary of the New York Native's coverage of the health crisis.

Hässig, A., H. Kremer, S. Lanka, W-X. Liang and K. Stampfli. Fifteen Years of AIDS. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 3, Spring 1998. An overview of AIDS after fifteen years. "The continuous failure in the prevention and treatment of AIDS is rooted in the misinterpretation of an inflammatory autoimmune process as a lethal, viral venereal disease."

Haverkos, Harry W. The Epidemiologic Scope of Kaposi's Sarcoma. Oncology, June, 1996. "Other factors, such as a second sexually transmitted organism, genetics, and nitrite inhalant use, may predispose HIV-infected persons to Kaposi's sarcoma."

Hodgkinson, Neville. Let's Have an International Inquiry. New African, Nov. 1996, p. 6. "I believe Africa has suffered most from the bad science at the root of the 'HIV' concept, and that there is an urgent need for an impartial, international inquiry to establish the truth about AIDS and clear up the confusion."

Hodgkinson, Neville. Zeitgeist: World AIDS Conference. The European, June 22, 1998. A summary of controversy at the 1998 Geneva AIDS Conference.

Immen, Wallace. AIDS Experts Issue Drug Warnings. Globe & Mail, June 12, 1997. Dangers of "morning after" treatments.

Interview: Nobel Prize Winner Kary Mullis on AIDS. Rethinking AIDS, No. 10, Mar/Apr 1994.

James K. and T.B. Hargreave. Immunosuppression by seminal plasma and its possible clinical significance. Immunology Today 5, 1984, p. 357.

Jones, Colman. In 1991, The Case of Kimberly Bergalis Terrified the Nation When Government Health officials Reported This Young College Student Had Contracted AIDS from her Dentist. But Did She? SPIN, Aug. 1994, p. 79.

Jones, Colman. Fudged Facts on AIDS:Science Does a Number of AIDS. Now (Toronto), Mar. 9-15, 2000. Africa begins to doubt the AIDS establishment: "Nelson Mandela's successor says 'no thanks' to western drug companies - just the start of a new, made-in-Africa campaign against AIDS orthodoxies."

Jones, Colman. Last Year the U.S. Rejected Large-scale Trials of the Current HIV Vaccines... Spin, Vol. 10, No. 10, Jan. 1995. The Third World as a testing ground for experimental drugs and "damaged goods."

Kastrissios, H., J-R. Suarez, et al. Characterizing Patterns of Drug-taking Behavior with a Multiple Drug Regimen in an AIDS Clinical Trial. AIDS, Dec. 3, 1998. Erratic adherence to prescribed drug-taking behavior.

Koliadin, V.L. Critical Analysis of the Current Views on the Nature of AIDS. Genetica, Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, 1995.

Kremer, Heinrich. Acquired Iatrogenic Death Syndrome (AIDS). Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 4, Nov-Dec 1996.

Krynen, Philippe. Looking from Inside. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 2, Winter, 1997-8. An overview of AIDS and the health situation in Africa.

Landstreet, Lynna. AIDS: Some Alternative Theories. Coming On (Toronto), Fall, 1988.

Langone, John. AIDS: Special Report. Discover, Dec. 1985. The AIDS virus is not as easily transmitted as first believed but is "the fatal price one can pay for anal intercourse." A mixture of orthodox, dissident and alarmist ideas.

Lauritsen, John. 'AIDS' Criticism in Europe. New York Native, June 15, 1992. "HIV and AZT questioned; U.S. press blackout continues."

Lehrman, Nathaniel S. Muzzling and Destroying AIDS Dissenters: The McCarthy Inquisition's Latest Phase. Rethinking AIDS, Vol. 1, No. 9, Jan-Feb. 1994. The smearing and persecution of scientific dissenters.

Male Circumcision Lessens AIDS Risk, Researchers Say. Toronto Star, Aug. 18, 1995.

Maver, Robert. HIV Infection as Leading Cause of Death in Young Adults? Rethinking AIDS, Vol. I, no. 7, July 1993, p. 1. A refutation of the contention that HIV deaths are prevalent in the young adult population at large.

Mavligit, G.M., M. Talpaz, F.T. Hsia et al. Chronic immune stimulation by sperm alloantigens: Support for the hypothesis that spermatozoa induce immune dysregulation in homosexual males. Journal of the American Medical Association 251, 1984, p. 237.

Mullis, Kary B. A Hypothetical Disease of the Immune System That May Bear Some Relation to the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome. Genetica, Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, 1995.

Mullis, Kary B.. Nobody Has to Cure AIDS To Get Paid. Rethinking AIDS, No. 10, Mar/Apr 1994.

Neil, Andrew. The Great Aids Myth Is Finally Laid to Rest. Sunday Times, June 23, 1996.

Nicholson, Lloyd. Health Notes: The Pot Is Boiling. Angles (Vancouver), June, 1994, p. 6. On HIV without AIDS, smoking and other co-factors, the failure of AZT, nutritional medicine, T-cell counts.

Ortleb, Charles L. Gallo's Epidemic of Lies. New York Native, July 6, 1992.

Ostrom, Neenyah. 'Dr. AIDS Monor' Speaks. New York Native, June 20, 1994. Dr. Paul Cheney discusses possible connections between AIDS and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.

Ostrom, Neenyah. Gallo Accused of 'Errors and Omissions' in Scientific Report. New York Native, June 20, 1994.

Ostrom, Neenyah. Gallo Does It Again. New York Native, Oct. 17, 1994. A critique of Dr. Robert Gallo and the journal Science.

Ostrom, Neenyah. Outbreak. New York Native, March 27, 1995. Speculations about the cause and proper treatment of KS.

Ostrom, Neenyah. Retrovirusgate. New York Native, Nov. 28-Dec. 5, 1994. "Have all the retroviral findings in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Been Derailed Because They Resemble HIV Just a Little Too Closely?"

Ostrom, Neenyah. Should It Be Called KS Fatigue Syndrome? New York Native, March 8, 1993. Possible connections between KS and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.

Papadopulos-Eleopulos, Eleni. Looking Back on the Oxidative Stress Theory of AIDS. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 5, Midwinter, 1998-9.

Papadopulos-Eleopulos, Eleni. Reappraisal of AIDS - Is the Oxidation Induced by the Risk Factors the Primary Cause? Medical Hypotheses, 1988, Vol. 25, pp. 151 - 162.

Ratcliffe, Molly. AIDS Babes? Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 3, Sept.-Oct. 1995. A new look at Romanian AIDS children suggesting causes other than infection with HIV.

Root-Bernstein, Robert S. Agenda for U.S. AIDS Research Is Due for a Complete Overhaul. The Scientist, April 4, 1994.

Root-Bernstein, Robert S. Five Myths About AIDS That Have Misdirected Research and Treatment. Genetica, Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, 1995.

Root-Bernstein, Robert S. Semen Alloantigens and Lymphocytotoxic Antibodies in AIDS and ICL. Genetica, Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, 1995.

Russell, Alex. The AIDS/HIV Debate. IQ Magazine (London), Vol. 2, No. 3, Oct.-Nov. 1993. "The HIV Myth is the most profitable and therefore the most cynically sustained hoax since the Turin Shroud."

Schoch, Russell. A Conversation with Kary Mullis. California Monthly, Sept. 1994, Vol. 105, No. 1, pp. 16-21.

Selvey, J.F., M.L. Alampi and R.S. Scharffenberg. Aromatic Hydrocarbon Toxins and Their Derivatives as a Non-Viral Cause of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome. Project AIDS International, 1995. Sexual lubricants and other benzene products and immunosuppression.

Shenton, Joan. AIDS and Africa. Rethinking AIDS, Vol. I, No. 5, May, 1993, p. 1. On possible reasons for the misrepresentation on African AIDS statistics.

Shenton, Joan. Whatever Happened to AIDS in Haiti? Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 1, May-June 1996. What is or was Haitian AIDS and what caused it?

Stewart, Gordon T. The Epidemiology and Transmission of AIDS: A Hypothesis Linking Behavioral and Biological Determinants to Time, Person and Place. Genetica, Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, 1995.

Verney-Elliott, Michael. AIDS: Designer Science, Virtual Virology, & Dodgy Crystal Balls. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 5, Jan.-Feb. 1996. "I suspect that HIV is no more than a group of proteins generated by cells that have undergone change."

Versi, Anver. AIDS: The Epidemic That Never Was. New Africa, No. 314, Dec. 1993, p. 8. Phillipe and Evelyne Krynen, leading experts on African AIDS, radically revise their opinion on the value of HIV testing and on the existence of a wide-spread epidemic. "The world has been brainwashed about AIDS. It has become a disease in itself, without the necessity of having sick people any more." British journalist Neville Hodgkinson is quoted on the vested interests behind a manufactured crisis.

Watney, Simon. Paying for AIDS. Gay Times, May 1993. The state of UK AIDS funding.

Weiss, Robin. Of Myths and Mischief. Discover, Dec. 1994. A critique of "AIDS myths" including dissident ideas.

Young, Ian. Challenging the Mainstream Consensus: AIDS Dissidents (in) Raymond A. Smith (ed.) Encyclopedia of AIDS, Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 1998.

Zabinski, Fred. AIDS - Deadly Plague of Billion-Dollar Hoax? Spheric (New York), Oct. 1994. An overview of dissident ideas.

HIV Hypothesis

Baumgartner, Michael Urs. The History and Consequences of the 'HIV/AIDS'-Hypothesis. Continuum, June-July 1995. A timeline of events from the first cases of PCP and KS among homosexual men to the 1995 dissident conference in Argentina.

Bethell, Tom. Could Duesberg Be Right? National Review, Aug. 17, 1992.

Boon, Marcus. Naming the Enemy: AIDS Research, Contagion and the Discovery of HIV. Cultronix (Pittsburgh), No. 4.

Brady, Diane. New AIDS Doubt: Scientists Are Questioning the Role of HIV. Maclean's, Nov. 12, 1990, p. 68.

Burkett, Elinor. Not Guilty? Miami Herald, Dec. 23, 1990. "If HIV is not the sole cause of AIDS, then the effort to fight the disease is in chaos." Included in the Tropic magazine supplement.

Christie, Huw. Do Antibody Tests Prove HIV (TM) Infection? Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 2, Winter 1997-8. Interview with Dr. Valendar F. Turner of Royal Perth Hospital, Australia.

Christie, Huw. HIV: Not the Monster We Think It Is? Positive Times, No. 17, July 1996.

Clement, Michael and Brad Honywill. 'Mind Field' for AIDS: Nobel Winner Says HIV May Not Exist. Sunday Sun (Toronto), Oct. 18, 1998.

Cohen, Jon. Duesberg and Critics Agree: Hemophilia Is the Best Test. Science, Vol. 266, Dec. 9, 1994.

Cohen, Jon. The Duesberg Phenomenon. Science, Vol. 266, Dec. 9, 1994.

Duesberg, Peter H. Foreign-Protein-Mediated Immunodeficiency in Hemophiliacs With and Without HIV. Genetica, Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, 1995. The author also provides a Preface to this issue of the journal which is devoted to dissident AIDS papers.

Duesberg, Peter H. Infectious AIDS - Stretching the Germ Theory Beyond Its Limits? International Archives of Allergy Immunology, Vol. 103, 1994, pp. 103-118.

Duesberg, Peter H. The AIDS Heresy: An Exchange. New York Review of Books, Aug. 8, 1998. An exchange with reviewer Richard Horton.

Duesberg, Peter H. and Bryan J. Ellison. Is HIV the Cause of AIDS? Policy Review, Fall, 1990, p. 70. The authors' reply to fourteen letters (also published in this issue) responding to their previous article (Summer, 1990). "We are gratified to find our challenge against the virus-AIDS hypothesis finally generating the debate that should have occurred within science, and among the tax-paying public, years ago."

Duesberg, Peter H. and Bryan J. Ellison. Is the AIDS Virus a Science Fiction? Policy Review, Summer, 1990. "Immunosuppressive behavior, not HIV, may be the cause of AIDS."

Duesberg's, Er, Helper? Freshman GOP Congressman Questions HIV's Role. Poz, Aug.-Sept., 1995, p. 18.

Ebden, Theresa. Nobel Scientist Questions Cause of AIDS. Toronto Star, Oct. 19, 1998. P. A15. Report on Kary Mullis' visit to Toronto.

Ellison, Bryan J. The Hidden Agenda Behind HIV. Rethinking AIDS, Vol. 1, No. 9, Jan-Feb. 1994. Information on a semi-secret wing of the Centers for Disease Control, the Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS).

Farber, Celia. HIV and Breastfeeding. Mothering, Sept.-Oct. 1998.

Farber, Celia. Kary Mullis, Winner of the 1993 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Has Rocked the World of Science with His Party-boy Surfer Demeanor. Now He's Ready to Take on the AIDS Establishment. SPIN, July, 1994, p. 63.

Farber, Celia. The Gray Zone. Spin, Vol. 12, No. 1, April 1996. AIDS without HIV.

Farber, Celia. In front of a hushed crowd... Spin, Vol. 10, No. 11, Feb. 1995. A profile of AIDS dissident Dr. Robert Willner and his "theater of dissent" - pricking his finger with HIV-Positive blood.

Graham, Lamar. The Heretic. GQ, Nov., 1993. On Robert Root-Bernstein. Reports his dismissal as columnist for The Sciences for asserting a multifactorial cause of AIDS.

Grube, John. Rethinking AIDS. Icon (Toronto), March 1997. A profile of Peter Duesberg.

Guccione, Bob, Jr. Interview: Professor Peter Duesberg Believes HIV Doesn't Cause AIDS. Is He the Heretic the Medical Establishment Claims, or a 20th-Century Galileo? SPIN, Sept., 1993, p. 94. Includes remarks on drugs and AIDS and on the role of AZT in the deaths of Arthur Ashe and Kimberly Bergalis.

Hodgkinson, Neville. AIDS: The Emperor's Clothes. Sunday Times, 28 Nov., 1993. An overview of the HIV controversy.

Hodgkinson, Neville. Paradigms Lost. Continuum, Vol. 2, Nos. 5-6, Nov. 1994 - Jan. 1995. In an interview with Huw Christie, the former Science Correspondent of the Sunday Times discusses what drove him to question the HIV theory and the subsequent reaction of the AIDS industry.

Hodgkinson, Neville. Top Chemist Urges Rethink on AIDS. Sunday Times, 28 Nov., 1993, P. 1. Nobel Prize Winner Kary Mullis states that HIV is "not probable" as a cause of AIDS. "What started out as a working hypothesis has now become a sort of religious position."

Hodgkinson, Neville. Zeitgeist: World AIDS Conference. The European, June 22, 1998. An overview of contentious issues at the time of the 1998 World AIDS Conference in Geneva.

Johnson, Christine. Bad Blood or Bad Science: Are Haemophiliacs with AIDS Diagnoses Really Infected with HIV? Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 4, Late Summer, 1998.

Jones, Colman. What If HIV Does Not Exist? Now (Toronto), Nov. 21-27, 1996.

Jones, Colman. The fight over whether or not HIV causes AIDS... Spin, Vol. 11, No. 2, May, 1995. Report on the state of the debate.

Lang, Serge. HIV and AIDS: Questions of Scientific and Journalistic Responsibility. Yale Scientific, Fall, 1995, pp. 8-23 and Winter, 1995, pp. 15-21.

Lanka, Stefan. Collective Fallacy: Rethinking HIV. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 3, Sept.-Oct. 1996. Questioning the existence of HIV.

Lanka, Stefan. HIV: Reality or Artefact? Newlife, July-Aug. 1995. "AIDS research has no scientific base."

Lauritsen, John. Truth Is Bustin' Out All Over. New York Native, July 18, 1994, p. 14. A detailed summary of debates between defenders and critics of the HIV hypothesis at a symposium sponsored by the Pacific Division of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Levy, Jay A. HIV Research: A Need to Focus on the Right Target. Lancet, June 24, 1995. "Focussing on the virus is akin to treating the symptoms but not the cause."

Maver, Robert. HIV Infection as Leading Cause of Death in Young Adults? Rethinking AIDS, Vol. 1, No. 7, July 1993. Youth AIDS deaths are largely related to drug abuse.

Mullis, Kary. The Medical Establishment vs. The Truth. Penthouse, Sept. 1998. Nobel prize winning scientists's dissent from the HIV hypothesis.

Papadopulos-Eleopulos, Eleni. The Haemophilia Connection. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 4, Nov.-Dec. 1995. Haemophilia and HIV.

Papadopulos-Eleopulos, Eleni. Is HIV the Cause of AIDS? Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 1, Autumn 1997. A leading researcher and leader of the "Perth group" is interviewed by Christine Johnson.

Papadopulos-Eleopulos, Eleni, Valendar F. Turner and John M. Papadimitriou. Has Gallo Proven the Role of HIV in AIDS? Emergency Medicine, June 1993, Vol. 5, No. 2, pp. 113 - 123.

Papadopulos-Eleopulos, Eleni, Valendar F. Turner, et al. HIV Antibodies: Further Questions and a Plea for Clarification. Current Medical Research and Opinion, Vol. 13, No. 10, 1997. "The evidence for the existence of HIV and its putative role in AIDS must be reappraised."

Papadopulos-Eleoposlos, Eleni, Valendar F. Turner, John M. Papadimitriou and David Causer. The Isolation of HIV: Has It Really Been Achieved - The Case Against. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 3, Sept.-Oct. 1996. A lengthy, full-referenced paper questioning the isolation of HIV.

Papadopulos-Eleopulos, Eleni, V.F. Turner, J.M. Papadimitriou, D. Causer, B. Hedland-Thomas & B.A.P. Page. A Critical Analysis of the HIV-T4-Cell-AIDS Hypothesis. Genetica, Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, 1995.

Papadopulos-Eleopulos, Eleni, V.F. Turner, J.M. Papadimitriou & D. Causer. Factor VIII, HIV and AIDS in Haemophiliacs: An Analysis of Their Relationship. Genetica, Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, 1995.

Philpott, Paul. The Isolation Question. Reappraising AIDS, Vol. 5, No. 6, June-Aug. 1997. "How an Australian biophysicist and her simple observations have taken center stage among AIDS reappraisers."

Rasnick, David. "Non-infectious HIV is Pathogenic: Dr. David Ho et al Duck Questions, Flee Scrutiny, Make Absurd Statements." Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 6, June-July 1997.

Rivers, Daniel. Why AIDS Is Not an Infectious Disease. Gay & Lesbian Times, May 11, 1995. Report on a talk by Peter Duesberg. "You find truth in science by doing research and testing hypotheses, not by ridiculing your opponents and taking their grants away."

Ruether, Rosemary Radford. The HIV-AIDS Hypothesis and Its Critics. Open Eye, No. 2, 1993. An eco-feminist view of AIDS.

Russell, Alex. 'Deconstructing HIV'? Thud (London), Oct. 14, 1996.

Russell, Alex. Does HIV Exist? Echo: The Magazine of the Southwest, No. 212, Oct. 30, 1997.

Russell, Alex. HIV Does Not Exist. Positive Nation, Dec. 1997 - Jan. 1998. "HIV imprinting has become subconsciously internalised on such a global scale that people will not be able to accept the brute reality that 'HIV' does not exist."

Russell, Alex. The Political Taxonomy of 'HIV': Selling a Signifier Without a Signified. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 5, Midwinter, 1998-9.

Schoch, Russell. Peter Duesberg is Positive. California Monthly, June, 1996. "The major lesson of Duesberg's book is that big science cannot be trusted to police itself."

Thomas, Charles A., Jr., Kary B. Mullis and Phillip E. Johnson. What Causes AIDS? It's an Open Question. Reason, June, 1994, P. 18. A summary of flaws in the HIV hypothesis, with proposals for a new approach.

Turner, Valendar and Andrew McIntyre. The Yin & Yang of HIV. Nexus New Times Magazine, Vol. 6, No. 4, June-July 1999. (Part 1 of 2).

Werth, Barry. By AIDS Obsessed. GQ, August, 1991, p. 144. Investigations of Dr. Robert Gallo by John Crewdson and others. "Crewdson saw a cover-up, political intrigue, people afraid to talk."

Whipple, Warren. Fact or Fiction: What Really Do We Know About HIV and AIDS? Creative Loafing (Atlanta), Vol. 23, No. 49, April 29, 1995.

Willner, Robert E. A Call for the Truth About AIDS. To Your Health (Brooklyn, NY), Vol. VI, No. 10, Jan.-Feb. 1995. "A white paper on the Viral-AIDS Hypothesis."

Yoffe, Emily. Is Kary Mullis God? (Or Just the Big Kahuna?) Esquire, July, 1994, p. 68. A profile of the co-recipient of the 1993 Nobel Prize for chemistry quotes his belief that "AIDS isn't caused by any one virus..."

Holistic Therapies

Bennett, Stuart. Ayurvedic Medicine and Lifestyle Changes. Continuum, Vol. 1, No. 5, Aug.-Sept., 1993.

Carroll, Roz. Supporting the Immune System: Psychoneuroimmunology and the Role of Massage. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 3, Sept.-Oct. 1995. "Illness is not a sign that the body has broken down, but that it is trying to re-establish equilibrium."

Chaitow, Leon. Interview. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 5, Feb/Mar 1997. "Holistic doctor Leon Chaitow combines practical experience, intellectual wisdom and some controversy in a wide-ranging interview focused on immunity and health with Rafael Ramos and Huw Christie."

Downey, Donn. Man Fights for Right to Marijuana. Globe & Mail, Aug. 6, 1998. "HIV and AIDS-infected patients who would benefit from the use of marijuana are being thwarted by a federal government that provides only 'illusory' access to the illicit drug, lawyers for an AIDS patient argued."

Downton, Joseph. Cure du Jour. The Advocate, Feb. 21, 1995. Report on kombucha tea.

Harper, Tim. AIDS Victim Pleads for Right to Smoke Pot. Toronto Star, Dec. 19, 1997. "A doctor is asking Health Minister Allan Rock for permission to prescribe marijuana to help a patient with AIDS live longer."

Harris, Gina. Powerful Pot: AIDS Patients and Doctors Continue Fight to Access Marijuana. Xtra! (Toronto), Jan. 23, 1998.

Irving Company to Test Aloe Treatment in 'AIDS' Patients. New York Native, June 27, 1994.

Lightwater, Tom. HIV & AIDS. Newlife, Sept.-Oct. 1994. An HIV-Positive man shares his holistic regimen.

Lucas, Tanjong. Cameroon's Magic Vine - The Hope for the Future. New African, No. 323, Oct. 1994.

Ocamb, Karen. Holistic Turnaround. Poz, April-May, 1994. Report on Fred Bingham's abandonment of AZT and his reversal of an AIDS diagnosis through holistic means. Bingham founded the Direct AIDS Alternative Information Resources (DAAIR).

O'Hehir, Andrew. Smoke and Mirrors. Spin, Vol. 13, No. 1, April, 1997. The Clinton administration's proscription of medical marijuana use."

Osburn, Lynn. Hemp Seed Nutrition. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 1, May-June, 1996.

Ostrom, Neenyah. Lem: Is It the Vitamin C of the Immune System? New York Native, July 31, 1989. Report on LC-33 (lentinan).

Ratcliffe, Molly. The Amber Fluid. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 2, June-July 1995. On urine therapy as practised by Swami Pragyamuri of the Satyananda Yoga Centre in Balham, London.

Ratcliffe, Molly. Urine Therapy: New Possibilities for an Ancient Therapy. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 5, Midwinter, 1998-9.

Ravitsksy, Martin. Candidiasis. Newlife, May, 1996. Holistic treatments for candidiasis.

Stevens, John. Allicin: The Goodness of Garlic. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 5, Jan.-Feb. 1996.

Intravenous and Recreational Drugs

Bethell, Tom. At Gay Clubs Across the Country, the Air Is Heavy with the Smell of Poppers... Spin, Vol. 10, No. 8, Nov. 1994. The possible role of poppers (nitrite inhalants) in AIDS and KS.

Duesberg, Peter. AIDS Acquired by Drug Consumption and Other Non-contagious Risk Factors. Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Vol. 55, PP. 201 - 277.

Duesberg, Peter. AIDS: Virus or Drug-induced? American Journal of Continuing Education in Nursing, No. 7, 1995, pp. 31-44.

Duesberg, Peter. Peter Duesberg and the Right of Reply. Rethinking AIDS, Vol. I, No. 6, June, 1993, p. 1. A reply to an article in Nature (No. 362, 1993) arguing against Duesberg's "drug-AIDS" hypothesis, published here after Nature denied Duesberg's right to reply.

Duesberg, Peter and David Rasnick. The AIDS Dilemma: Drug Diseases Blamed on a Passenger Virus. Genetica, No. 104, 1998.

Duesberg, Peter and David Rasnick. The Drug-AIDS Hypothesis. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 5, Feb.-Mar. 1997. A lengthy, fully-referenced paper on AIDS and "the drug epidemic."

Ellison, B.J., A.B. Downey & Peter H. Duesberg. HIV as a Surrogate Marker for Drug Use: A Re-analysis of the San Francisco Men's Health Study. Genetica, Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, 1995.

Gibbons, Jacqui. Gay Clubber 'Killed by Reaction Between Ritonavir and Ecstasy'. Gay News (London), March 1997.

Haverkos, Harry W. & D.P. Drotman. Measuring Inhalant Nitrite Exposure in Gay Men: Implications for Elucidating the Etiology of AIDS-related Kaposi's Sarcoma. Genetica, Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, 1995.

Haverkos, Harry W., Paul F. Pinsky, et al. Disease Manifestation Among Homosexual Men with Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome: A Possible Role of Nitrites in Kaposi's Sarcoma. Sexually Transmitted Diseases, Oct.-Dec. 1985, Vol. 12, No. 4.

Haverkos, Harry W. and D. Peter Drotman. Measuring Inhalent Nitrite Exposure in Gay Men: Implications for Elucidating the Etiology of AIDS-related Kaposi's Sarcoma. Genetica, Vol. 95, 1995, pp. 157 - 164.

Haverkos, Harry W., Andrea N. Kopstein, et al. Nitrite Inhalents: History, Epidemiology, and Possible Links to AIDS. Environmental Health Perspectives, Vol. 102, No. 10, Oct. 1994, pp. 858 - 861.

Lauritsen, John. The Poppers-KS Connection. New York Native, June 13, 1994, p. 32. Following the scientific establishment's revisions in the AIDS paradigm, the National Institute on Drug Abuse reconsiders the possible connection between nitrite inhalants and Kaposi's sarcoma. Dr. Robert Gallo: "The nitrites could be the primary factor."

Lauritsen, John. Surveying Ascher and Schechter. Rethinking AIDS, Vol. I, No. 5, May, 1993, p. 1. Flaws in a study exonerating drugs from contributing to AIDS.

Lee, Stuart. Black Party. Stonewall News of NY, Nov. 15, 1993, p. 12. Short story exploring gay sex, drugs and disco prior to AIDS.

Lehrman, Nathaniel S., M.D. AIDS Risk and Oral Drugs. Rethinking AIDS, Vol. I, No. 6, 1993, p. 1.Mann, Cass. Poppers...High Time to Think Again? Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 3, Sept.-Oct. 1995. "The annual profit in the UK alone is estimated at 8.5 million Pounds."

McGrath, P.F. Panic in Needle Park. Eye (Toronto), Oct. 8, 1998. "Needle exchanges were supposed to slow the spread of HIV among addicts but infection rates are still rising."

Northmore, David. Poppers Head Underground Following Latest Clampdown. The Pink Paper, Jan. 31, 1997, p. 2.

Szymanski, Katie. Twenty-two Arrested at Morning Party. New York Blade, Aug. 21, 1998. A report on the Gay Men's Health Crisis' "annual orgy of sex and drugs" on Fire Island.

White, Mark. Cheap Thrills. Thud (London), No. 75, April 26, 1996. An examination of poppers on the gay scene.

Young, Ian. The Poppers Story: The Rise and Fall and Rise of 'the Gay Drug'. Steam, Vol. 2, No. 4, Winter, 1994.

See also under "Holistic Therapies" for articles on medical marijuana.

Mind and Spirit/ Psychoneuroimmunology

Ader, R., N. Cohen and D. Felten. Psychoneuroimmunology: Interactions Between the Nervous System and the Immune System. Lancet, Vol. 345, 1995, pages 99 - 103. A comprehensive review of the field of psychoneuroimmunology, with a bibliography.

Blalock, J. The Syntax of Immune-Neuroendocrine Communication. Immunology Today, Vol. 15, No. 11, 1994, pages 504-511. The immunoregulatory role of the brain and the sensory function of the immune system. A detailed discussion of a common chemical language for communications within and between the immune and neuroendocrine systems.

Ellner, Michael. Programmed to Die: Cultural Hypnosis & AIDS. Enspire Magazine, Feb. 1996.

Ellner, Michael. Protective Stupidity: Epidemic Hysteria, Mass Hypnosis and Escaping from the AIDS Zone. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 2, Winter, 1997-8.

Ellner, Michael. The Social Function of Self-Deception. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 6, Summer, 1999. The "AIDS Zone" as a group-fantasy trance.

Gilbert, Susan. Doom-and-gloom Outlook Harms Health. Globe & Mail, July 27, 1998. A University of Kentucky study showing how thoughts can affect the immune system.

Northmore, David. Wishing I Was Unlucky... The Pink Paper, Dec. 1966. "Why some gay men can't bear being HIV Negative."

Russell, Alex. 'HIV' Witchboys...Confession, Possession, Obsession. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 1, Autumn, 1997. Witch trials, inquisitions, and belief in HIV. "I may owe my professional career to...working with this virus but I despise it. And anything I can do to stop it transmitting around the world I would gladly do. And that includes putting you in your place." - Prof. Richard Tedder, royalty-holder of the first British 'HIV' test.

Young, Ian. The AIDS Cult and Its Seroconverts. Continuum, Vol. 4, Nos. 4 & 5. Cultic aspects of the HIV-Positive community.

Young, Ian. Cocktails for One: AIDS Treatment as a Social Sacrament. The HIV Realist (Toronto), Vol. 1, No. 8, Dec. 1998. Expectations and realities of AIDS treatments. Includes an account of "Facilitated Communication" as an example of manifested unconscious beliefs.

Young, Ian. Rock Hudson and Mr. Hyde: A Gay Psychodrama. Honcho, Oct., 1992, p. 66. Psychic and other factors behind the film actor's illness.

Origins

Cantwell, Alan, Jr. AIDS Is Not African. New African, No. 323, Oct. 1994. Possible iatrogenic origins of AIDS.

Creedon, Jeremiah. Second Opinions on AIDS. Utne Reader, Sept.-Oct. 1992. Several theories on AIDS origins, including contaminated polio vaccines.

Curtis, Tom. The Origin of AIDS. Rolling Stone, March 19, 1992. Suggests AIDS may be connected to the distribution of experimental vaccines in Africa.

Duesberg, Peter. A Debate Over the Causes of AIDS. San Francisco Chronicle, May 10, 1996.

Forest, Waves. Designer Diseases: AIDS as Biological and Psychological Warfare. Now What, No. 1, Fall, 1987.

France, David. Challenging the Conventional Stance on AIDS. New York Times, Dec. 22, 1998, P. F6. A report on alternative theories of AIDS voiced at the Harlem AIDS Forum.

Jones, Colman. HIV Ideologues Lock Horns Over the Cause of AIDS. Now (Toronto), March 30 - April 5, 1995.

Root-Bernstein, Robert S. Do We Know the Cause(s) of AIDS? Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 33, 1990, p. 480.

Root-Bernstein, Robert S. Non-HIV Immunosuppressive Factors in AIDS: A Multifactorial, Synergistic Theory of AIDS Etiology. Research in Immunology, No. 141, p. 815.

Rosco, Jerry. How We Lost that Story: Did the Media Ignore the Real Origin of AIDS? Bay Area Reporter, July 29, 1993, p. 1. Explores possible links between smallpox vaccine and AIDS.

Rotello, Gabriel. The Birth of AIDS. Out, April, 1994, p. 88. Speculations on the origins of AIDS and HIV, including cases in the 19th Century and the 1950's.

Rubin, H. Etiology of AIDS. Science, No. 241, 1988, p. 1389.

Sonnabend, Joseph A. Fact and Speculation About the Cause of AIDS. AIDS Forum, Vol. 2, No. 1, May, 1989.

Thomas, Charles A., Jr., Kary B, Mullis and Phillip E. Johnson. What Causes AIDS? Reason, June 1994, pp. 18 - 23.

Thomas, Charles A., Jr., Kary B. Mullis and Phillip E. Johnson. What Causes AIDS: The Debate Continues. Reason, Dec. 1994. Letters and rebuttal.

Other Infections

Andriette, Bill. The TB Epidemic: Why It Threatens You. The Guide, June, 1992. TB and AIDS.

Berkowitz, Richard. The Cofactor Factor. Spin, Vol. 11, No. 12, March 1996. "A new strain of herpes is being touted as the missing link between HIV and AIDS."

Cantwell, Alan R., Jr. Bacteriological Investigation and Histologic Observations of Variably Acid-Fast Bacteria in Three Cases of Cutaneous Kaposi's Sarcoma. Growth, No. 45, 1981, p. 79.

Cantwell, Alan R., Jr., M.D. Kaposi's Sarcoma and Variably Acid-Fast Bacteria In Vivo in Two Homosexual Men. Cutis, Vol. 32, July, 1983.

Cantwell, Alan R., Jr. Necroscopic Findings of Variably Acid-Fast Bacteria in a Fatal Case of Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome and Kaposi's Sarcoma. Growth, No. 47, 1983, p. 129.

Cantwell, Alan R., Jr., M.D. and Jerry W. Lawson, M.D. Necroscopic Findings of Pleomorphic, Variably Acid-Fast Bacteria in a Fatal Case of Kaposi's Sarcoma. Journal of Dermatologic Surgery and Oncology, Nov., 1981, p. 923.

Feschuk, Scott. Infections by Health Worker Spur Tuberculosis Warning. Globe and Mail, Aug. 12, 1994. "TB bacteria often sit dormant for years and become active when a person's immune system is weakened by age, drug abuse or AIDS."

Friedman, Lloyd N., Michael T. Williams et al. Tuberculosis, AIDS, and Death Among Substance Abusers on Welfare in New York City. New England Journal of Medicine, Vol. 334, No. 13, Mar. 28, 1996.

Hässig, A., H. Kremer, Liang Wen-Xi and K. Stampfli. The Significance of Infection with Parenterally Transmitted Hepatitis Viruses in the Pathogenesis of AIDS. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 4, Nov.-Dec. 1996. "Research is fundamentally a state of mind involving continual re-examination of the doctrines upon which current thought and action are based. It is, therefore, critical of existing practices."

Haverkos, H.W. Is Kaposi's Sarcoma Caused by New Herpesvirus? Biomedicine and Pharmacotherapy, Vol. 50, 1996, pp. 318 - 319.

Henig, Robin Marantz. The Lessons of Syphilis in the Age of AIDS. Civilization, Nov.-Dec. 1995. A cultural and medical comparison of syphilis and AIDS.

Jones, Colman. Syphilis Sleuth. Now (Toronto), Sept. 21-27, 1995. Profile of AIDS dissident John Scythes.

New Herpes Virus Linked to Kaposi's. Globe & Mail, Dec. 16, 1994.

Ostrom, Neenyah. A Stomach Virus. New York Native, June 15, 1992. Gastrointestinal symptoms link AIDS and chronic fatigue syndrome.

Ostrom, Neenyah. HHV-6 Linked to Blood Clotting Disorder That Is Often Found in AIDS. New York Native, Oct. 10, 1994.

Ostrom, Neenyah. HHV-6's Hostile Takeover. New York Native, May 15, 1995. Possible role of a herpes virus in AIDS.

Ratcliffe, Molly. Preventing Herpes. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 1, April-May 1995. The relationship between herpes and diet.

Politics and Policies

Altman, Lawrence K. U.S. Reporting Sharp Decrease in AIDS Deaths. New York Times, Feb. 28, 1997. "Protease inhibitor drugs are unlikely to have had a major effect on AIDS deaths in new York City because relatively small numbers of people would have been taking them early in 1996."

Ankomah, Baffour. Aids - The American Connection? New African, No. 314, Dec. 1993. A summary of speculations about a U.S. biowarfare connection to AIDS.

Baumgartner, Michael U. Human Rights and Policy. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 6, Summer, 1999. Examples of human rights violations related to AIDS.

Berkowitz, Richard. Gay sex establishments... Spin, Vol. 11, No. 11, Feb. 1996. Controversies around gay sex clubs and attempts to shut them down.

Burnett, Richard. Just Saying No: Should a Mother Prevent Her Kids from Taking AZT? Xtra! (Toronto), Feb. 24, 2000. A mother faces the choice of forced administration of AIDS cocktails to her children or having them taken away from her.

Caloz, Marie. Alone, Locked Up & In Agony. Xtra! (Toronto), Oct. 9, 1997. The fate of prisoners with AIDS.

Conlan, Mark Gabrish. Paul Philpott: Blacklisted! Zenger's, Dec. 1996. Firing and ostracism of an AIDS dissident. "Paul, I'm paying you with HIV money! Here you are, on TV and in the newspapers, saying that this is wasted money!"

Coutts, Jane and Henry Hess. Doctor Charged in Man's Suicide. Globe & Mail, June 21, 1996. A physician charged with giving an HIV+ man a lethal dose of pills.

Edelson, Stuart. New-speak and Sexual Politics in the Midst of a Plague. OutWeek, March 4, 1990.

Edge, Simon. Why John Is Angry. Capital Gay, April 1, 1994. "We are occasionally waved around as shrouds and skeletons to justify the degree of alarm. But we are basically living the social death which precedes actual death."

Farber, Celia. If control freaks in Congress get their way, every newborn infant in the country will be tested for AIDS... Spin, Vol. 11, No. 7, Oct. 1995.

Forrest, Waves. AIDS: Biological and Psychological Warfare? The Challenger (Buffalo & Rochester), Nov. 22, 1995.

Gilden, Dave. The Hit List. POZ, Dec. 1999, p. 60. "Insurance companies are forcing more and more HIVers to choose between losing their policy or dropping their doctor."

Giraldo, Roberto. Milking the Market: Will Mothers Dish Out the W.H.O. Formula? Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 4, Late Summer 1998. HIV and breastfeeding.

Gov't. Rules for Health Workers May Lead to Mandatory HIV Tests. The Guide, August, 1991.

'HIV' Junta's Man-Made Mass Death. Death Camp (London), No. 20, May 1998. HIV scientists, doctors, counsellors and bureaucrats as "a new type of criminal."

Heretical Science: Alternative Medicine, AIDS - and Duncan Campbell. Open Eye, No. 3, 1995. A lengthy report on the dirty war against AIDS dissidents.

Johnson, Doug. What if having sex were a criminal offense?... Spin, Vol. 10, No. 12, March 1995. New laws restricting the activities of people diagnosed HIV-Positive.

Jones, Colman. Sign Oath or Get Out, AIDS Activists Told. Now (Toronto), Nov. 10-16, 1998. Orthodox AIDS activist group requires belief in HIV.

Kramer, Larry. After Seeing Schindler's List. The Advocate, April 19, 1994. "Why do we sit by as our people die, one after another, day by day, year after year?"

Leering, Janis. Controversial AIDS Group Denied Space. Xtra! (Toronto), July 30, 1998. HEAL (Toronto) denied space in a community centre for challenging predominant AIDS theories.

Leonard, Arthur S. Low Blows. POZ, March, 2000. "Nondisclosing HIVers are being sent to the slammer for having sex."

Miles, Sara. The Best Laid Plans. Out, April, 1994, p. 94. Proposed national health-care plans as they may affect people with HIV or AIDS.

Murphy, Brian. AIDS Obscures Injustice and Medicalizes Poverty. Canadian Dimension, July 1996.

Murphy, Brian. The Politics of AIDS. Third World Resurgence, July 1994.

Nazi-Style 'Final Solution' Next? Pentagon Wants to Brand AIDS Victims. Worker's Vanguard, April 11, 1986.

Ostrom, Neenyah. Dr. Sandra Mengele: Will San Francisco Turn Into Auschwitz II? New York Native, Sept. 9, 1996, p. 10. "Is the Health Department Director in San Francisco planning to jail HIV-positive people who refuse to take protease inhibitor cocktails?"

Ostrom, Neenyah. Would You Take a Vaccine From This Man? New York Native, Feb. 26, 1996. "Tony Fauci may be in control of AIDS, but does he have a clue?"

Papp, Leslie. Third World Participants Denied Visas. Toronto Star, July 11, 1996. Delegates to a Canadian AIDS conference refused entry.

Picard, André. HIV Deniers Should Be Jailed: Researcher: Head of AIDS Body Slams Fringe Movement. Globe & Mail, May 1, 2000.

Ross, Heather M. HIV Is the Cause: AIDS Action Now Wants Signed Oath. Xtra! (Toronto), Dec. 3, 1998. An orthodox AIDS group requires its members to sign a "loyalty oath" to the HIV theory.

Sadownick, Douglas. A Star Is Torn: The Fur Flies as Tinseltown's Favorite Causes Lock Horns Over Animal Research. POZ, Jan, 2000.

South African Leader Backs AIDS Policy. Reuters, April 16, 2000.

South Africa's Mbeki Defends His AIDS Scepticism. Reuters, April 16, 2000.

Thai Government Plan to Create AIDS Camps. The Pink Paper (London), March 13, 1998.

Thrush, Glenn. Prison Authorities in Two States Still Cling to an Outdated and Discriminatory Policy of Isolating Inmates who Test Positive for HIV. SPIN, June 1994, p. 85.

Tyrer, Nicola. How AIDS Is Hogging the Charity Stage. Evening Standard, June 28, 1996.

Van Toen, Bonnie. A Community Outraged. Capital Xtra! (Ottawa), April 17, 1998. Charges of mismanagement at the AIDS Committee of Ottawa.

Wakeford, Jim. Province Cut Risks AIDS Patient's Life. Toronto Star, Feb. 21, 1999. Dietary supplements for AIDS patients are no longer government-funded following recommendations of the provincial auditor.

Walker, Martin J. Totalitarian Science and Media Politics. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 5, Midwinter, 1998-9. AIDS propaganda and the manipulation of consensus.

Protease Inhibitors

Anderson, Mark K. The Big 'Tease. Westchester County Weekly, April 22, 1998. "Are protease inhibitors miracle AIDS drugs, or are researchers rushing down a dead-end street?"

Barker, Kate. Fluid Xchange. Xtra!, No. 340, Nov. 6, 1997. "Failure of the combination therapy cocktail is a sobering reality."

Batstone, David. To Be Or Not To Be? Spin, July 1997. "I feel like a toxic waste-dump, with all the drugs I'm putting into me," one man laments.

Conlan, Mark Gabrish. Protease Expert Dr. David Rasnick - A REAL Scientist Takes on the HIV/AIDS Myth and the Protease Inhibitor Hype. Zenger's, Nov. 1996, p. 6.

Farber, Celia. The End of the End? Spin, Vol. 13, No. 1, April, 1997. Is "cocktail" therapy bad science and wishful thinking?

Farber, Celia. Hope and Fury. Spin, Vol. 12, No. 7, Oct. 1996. Protease inhibitors and news from the International AIDS Conference in Vancouver.

Farber, Celia. Science Fiction. Gear, March 2000. A detailed exposé of the failure of protease inhibitor cocktails.

Farber, Celia. The Year in Hype. Spin, Vol. 12, No. 10, Jan. 1997. Protease inhibitors, viral load and AZT.

Garrett, Laurie. Protease Paunch: Drug's Mysterious Side-effects. Newsday, June 14, 1998. "My blood is so thick I can barely pump it through my body."

Harris, Elise. A Bump in the Road. Out, July 1998. "Lazarus has gone back to the office" but protease inhibitors cause physical anomalies and dangerous medical conditions.

Lauritsen, John. Protease Inhibitors: Hope and Hype. Provincetown Positive, No. 22, May 1997.

Lauritsen, John. Protease Inhibitors in Provincetown. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 5, Feb/Mar 1997.

O'Hearn, Seawn. Death Is Not a "Side Effect". Magnus, Dec. 1999.

Papp, Leslie. Women Report Side-effects in Drugs Geared to Fight HIV. Globe & Mail, Jan. 17, 1998.

Rasnick, David. Inhibitors of HIV Protease Useless Against AIDS. Reappraising AIDS, Vol. 4, No. 8, August 1996. A protease expert criticizes protease inhibitors.

Rogers, Stephen. Coming Off Combos: Do You Believe in Life After 'AIDS Drugs'? Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 5, Midwinter, 1998-9.

Silversides, Ann. Buffalo Humps & Big Breasts. Xtra! (Toronto), Jan. 14, 1999. Alarming body changes resulting from protease inhibitor cocktails.

Trafford, Abijail. Treatment at What Cost? Washington Post, Feb. 16, 1999. Mary Fisher, who addressed the Republican National Convention in 1992, stops taking the "cocktail" that was making her sick.

Race and Colour

Geshekter, Charles L. Rethinking AIDS in Africa. Reappraising AIDS, Vol. 5, No. 7, Sept.-Oct. 1997. Under-development, racial stereotypes and other factors in the reporting of African AIDS.

Stoner, J.B. Government Commission Says AIDS is a Plague of Peoples of Color. Crusade Against Corruption (Marietta, Georgia), May, 1994. A white racist view of AIDS.

Versi, Anver. The Epidemic That Never Was. New African, No. 314, Dec. 1993. A reassessment of claims for AIDS on Africa.

Related Issues

Ausubel, Ken. The Troubling Case of Harry Hoxsey. New Age Journal, July/Aug. 1988. The persecution of a dissident cancer researcher.

Doctors Exposed in Profit for Drug-Recruitment Scandals. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 6, Summer, 1999. Physicians earning "finders' fees" for recruiting patients into drug trials.

Duesberg, Peter. The Enigma of Slow Viruses. Lancet, Vol. 342, p. 729. Review of "The Enigma of Slow Viruses" by P.P. Liberski.

Evans, Jeff. Viruses Spontaneously Mutating, Expert Says. The Computer Paper (Toronto), May 1998. Ideas about mutating computer viruses.

Immen, Wallace. Immune System's 'Off Switch' Found. Globe & Mail, May 24, 1996. "A Toronto researcher has discovered the chain of command that shuts off the immune system."

Lowther, William, with Ian Mather. Mystery Illness and the Gulf War. Maclean's, Aug. 23, 1993, p. 32. Possible causes for AIDS-like conditions in Gulf War veterans.

Many Cancer Tests Inaccurate. Globe & Mail, April 16, 1998.

O'Hara, Jane. Whistle-Blower. Macleans, Nov. 16, 1998. Drugmaker's attempt to control a leading hospital's research findings.

Valpy, Michael. Salvage Group Tackles Sick Kids' Image Disaster. Globe & Mail, Nov. 2, 1998. Conflict between a whistle-blowing physician and a large drug company creates a "medical ethics disaster."

Safe and Unsafe Sex

Berkowitz, Richard. The Truth Sucks: A Gay Man Explores the Real Risks for AIDS. New York Press, Vol. 8, No. 22, June 2-8, 1993, p. 1. Minimal risk of oral sex; problems of PWAs lying about their sexual activities.

De Stafano, George. Are Gay Men Having Safer Sex? OutWeek, Feb. 18, 1990. "Studies show slippage in rubbering up."

Farber, Celia. Unprotected. Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 5, Midwinter, 1998-9. Gay men eroticizing the HIV virus: "barebacking" and the power of lust and rage.

Gendin, Stephen. They Shoot Bare Backers, Don't They? Poz, Feb., 1999. "Semen-sharing as intense pleasure, deep intimacy, spiritual release, the ultimate taboo and more."

In the Company of Men. Out, Oct. 1997. Seven gay writers and thinkers discuss AIDS and "safe sex."

Jones, Colman. How Safe Is Safe Sex? Now (Toronto), April 20-26, 1995. "Mystery cases rock conventional HIV wisdom."

Many with HIV Shun Condoms, Study Finds. Globe and Mail, Aug. 11, 1994, p. A-8.

Osborne, Duncan. Sex Clubs: The Band Plays On. LGNY (New York), No. 1, April 9, 1995. Sexual behaviour in the clubs.

Plumley, Peter W. Condomania - Common Sense or Nonsense? The HEAL Bulletin (New York).

Sadownick, Doug. Untamed Youth. No. 16, Feb.-Mar. 1994. "Is Gay Generation X in Jeopardy? Has the safe sex message failed?"

Wright, Tom. Safe Sex: Seeking a New Definition. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 2, July-Aug. 1996.

Survivors

Alternatives 2000. POZ, April, 2000. Profiles of seven "HIV+" people on drug-free regimens and alternative medicine.

Boland, Paul. Lust for Life. Continuum, Vol.5, No. 2, Winter, 1997-8. Survival and the "AIDS madness".

Callen, Michael. The Finale. A memoir by the well-known AIDS dissident and long-term survivor.

Easterbrook, Phillipa. Surviving, and Other Problems. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 3, Sept.-Oct. 1995. An interview with the principal investigator of a long-term survivors study. "Dr. Easterbrook agreed that CD4 counts fluctuate according to a number of factors not related to immune activity."

Kevin. Lust for Life. Continuum, Vol. 4, No. 1, May-June 1996. The head of the Complementary Therapy Information Group on his decision, ten years before, not to take AIDS medication.

Lem, Sharon. Positive Healing: Some Long-Term Survivors Are Using Optimism, Not Drugs, As a Weapon. Toronto Sun, Aug. 8, 1999.

Marsa, Linda. Long-Term Survivor. Spin, Vol. 12, No. 2, May 1996. "AIDS pioneer Dr.Jay Levy reflects on 15 years on the front lines."

Null, Gary. AIDS Is Not a Death Sentence. Penthouse, Feb. 1994. Stories of four long-term survivors and their treatments.

Ratcliffe, Molly. Alive and Kicking. Thud, No. 68, March 8, 1996. An AIDS survivor who uses "holistic and non-toxic therapies."

Ratcliffe, Molly. Healing Circle. Continuum, Vol. 3, No. 6, Mar.-April 1996. "The Healing Circle in North London began as an empowerment group for gay men and now considers itself to be an extended family. It offers holistic therapies...to those with an HIV Positive diagnosis."

Rotello, Gabriel. The Healer Within. OutWeek, Jan. 14, 1990. On Niro Asistent Markoff of SHARE, and her "ridding her body of HIV".

Simmons, Todd. Living on the Edge. The Advocate, Dec. 26, 1995. Long-term survivors and speculation about a "genetically flawed strain of HIV."

Taylor, Stephen. Getting On With My So-called Life. Globe & Mail, Feb. 28, 1997. "When I thought I was going to die in six months, I was having a really good time...Please no more good news!"

Wells, Bill. What Do Many Healthy Long-time HIV Positive People Have in Common? HEAL Portland Bulletin, 11 Jan., 1997.

Walton, Claire. What Makes a Survivor? Continuum, Vol. 5, No. 5, Midwinter, 1998-9.

Vitamin Therapies and Nutrition

Fuerst, Mark. 'Vitamin C, Exercise, Diet Fight AIDS.' The Medical Post, May 27, 1986.

Gerhard, Susan. Choose Me. POZ, April, 2000. AIDS and nutritional supplements.

Heyman, Jason. Nutrition at VIII International Conference on AIDS. Life Extension Report, Vol. 12, No. 10, Oct. 1992.

Wells, Jody. Acquired Nutritional Deficiency Syndrome. Continuum, Vol. 1, No. 3, April-May 1993. "I contend that Acquired Nutritional Deficiency Syndrome be recognized as a necessary precursur of the illness known as AIDS."

Wells, Jody. HIV Dementia, Folic Acid...and Vitamin B-12. Continuum, Vol. 2, No. 2, April-May 1994.

Continuum. 172 Foundling Court, Brunswick Centre, London, England WC1N 1QE.

Death Camp. c/o Alex Russell, DMS Watson Science Library, University College, Gower St., London, England WC1E 6BT.

Genetica. Vol. 95, Nos. 1-3, March, 1995. Special issue on alternative AIDS hypotheses.

Magnus. 2215-R Market St., #495, San Francisco, CA 94114, U.S.A.

New Views in Healing & AIDS Update. Tree of Life Publications, 255 N. El Cielo Rd., #126, Palm Springs, CA 92262, U.S.A.

Praxis: A Journal Exploring AIDS as a Crisis in Consciousness. Curenow, PO Box 29386, Los Angeles, CA 90029, U.S.A.

Reappraising AIDS. 7514 Girard Ave. #1 - 331 La Jolla, CA 92037.

Zenger's. 1043 University Ave., Suite 102, San Diego, CA 92103, U.S.A.

As gay men, we have always been starved of self-affirming rituals. Locked out of most of the ceremonies around us, we crave ceremonies of our own, to initiate us, and to bind us to the rest of our tribe. It used to be that coming out filled some of those needs. But its defining significance has faded as homosexuality has become less furtive and sexual boundaries have blurred. Now, in the gay community of today, "getting tested" has replaced coming out as the most important ritual in the life of a gay man, its hypnotic power reinforced by official approbation.

The director of one gay health agency recently expressed her puzzlement that people testing Negative require counseling three times more often than those who test Positive. If we pay attention to the language of testing, it's hardly surprising: automatically, we understand something "positive" as good, something "negative" as bad. And once we are Positive, we "progress" to AIDS.

Journalist Celia Farber has called the putative AIDS virus "a demon which we worship with our terror." It seems the HIV testing ritual has now become the central rite of the terror cult. The testing ceremony is highly ritualized, demanding a visit to a sacred, rather fearsome place, the Test Site. Priests and acolytes are in attendance - the various physicians, psychiatrists, social workers, peer counselors and AIDS workers hovering or bustling about, many wearing white robes of office. The ceremony involves a blood sacrifice, drawn with a hypodermic by a nurse or paramedic. Some initiates faint. It is accompanied by highly structured readings from sacred texts - AIDS information scripts. It incorporates a Time of Trial - the stressful period of several days or weeks while waiting for one's results. And, if the test is passed, if the results are Positive, one is embraced into the community with new status - Positive status, accompanied by all manner of new benefits, attention and concern. The sad claim, "I never knew how much I was loved until I got AIDS" pops up again and again in interviews with PWAs.

While a Positive test result is said to be irreversible, a Negative result, we are warned, may be inaccurate, or reversed later. There are "windows of opportunity" which the demon virus may yet penetrate. As a result, some of us have become compulsive "repeat testers," returning again and again to the Test Site, enduring the harrowing ritual over and over.

The accepted "social marketing" model of AIDS avoidance is based on the assumption that sex for gay men is a mechanical procedure, a kind of addiction. Its complex meanings are ignored. A pair of recently published studies indicate that current "safe sex" and "AIDS information" campaigns tend to pressure gay men to seroconvert - and to take medicines whose "side effects" read like AIDS symptoms.

Over sixty research papers have shown that false HIV-Positive results can be triggered by a wide variety of factors, including flu, rheumatoid arthritis, hepatitis B vaccination, alcoholism, hemophilia and epstein-barr virus. Yet on the basis of Positive test results alone, thousands of us are frightened into taking the latest expensive, experimental drug "cocktails" (no olive, no napkin).

Studies by German virologist Stefan Lanka and by an Australian team led by Eleni Papadopoulos-Eleopoulos have shown that HIV has never actually been isolated, and that specific HIV antibodies may not exist. The "HIV test" may simply be reacting to combinations of proteins, present in the blood under a variety of conditions. The demon we worship may be nothing but a laboratory construct, a reflection of our own ignorance. It won't be the first time that initial medical hypotheses, stubbornly maintained as dogma, have eventually been proven wrong.

It's time we recognized that AIDS organizations are acting as flacks for the government and pimps for the pharmaceutical companies. We are given medical dogma instead of science, propaganda instead of information, and convenient sound bites instead of analysis. It's time to be skeptical again, as we were when the medical establishment insisted gays were mentally disturbed, or psychotic, and we were routinely brainwashed, electrocuted and lobotomized. It's time we kept our money in our community and solved our own problems, instead of throwing it into "research" that treats us as expendable guinea-pigs.

The German gay leader Kurt Hiller coined a slogan that used to appear in every issue of the old Body Politic magazine: "The liberation of homosexuals can only be the work of homosexuals themselves." We don't see that slogan any more. But it's as true as it ever was.

My friend, by the way, tested Negative. And he won't be going back.

At the turn of the Millennium, orthodox medical administration more and more resembles the Communist nations in their last years, or the dinosaurs in the days before the comet. The medical establishment is a lumbering, ungainly beast whose cost is rising with its ineffectiveness. Nevertheless, it is a beast with a million parasites; systems like AIDS administration provide employment to many. At the same time, the beginnings of a Twenty-first Century medicine are struggling to emerge, both practically and politically.

Of all the newly popular healing techniques, one of the most fascinating is hypnotherapy, whose provenance goes back to Anton Mesmer in the Eighteenth Century. Now, as hypnotherapists are applying their unorthodox approaches to the AIDS crisis, some of their intriguing ideas are being confirmed through the new science of psychoneuroimmunology.

Professional hypnotherapist Rev. Michael Ellner is the President of HEAL (Health Education AIDS Liaison) in New York City. He has been working with people affected by AIDS since the mid-Eighties. Bud Weiss, also with HEAL, is a psychiatric social worker with a background in theatre. I spoke with them in Manhattan after attending a lively HEAL meeting in Greenwich Village which concluded with a hypnotic "debriefing". Michael began by talking about HEAL's origins when, as one of the earliest AIDS organizations, it provided whole foods and nutritious meals.

Michael Ellner: "HEAL was started by Jim Fouratt, Gene Fedorko and a number of others. At that time, nobody knew what AIDS was; there was a lot of superstition and fear. A number of the initial members had GRID diagnoses and were now seeing themselves as long-term survivors, coming to HEAL meetings to talk about being alive! This was the first time I'd heard there were survivors. It peaked my interest and I began talking with them and pursuing relationships. As a hypnotherapist, I was very interested in working with catastrophic illness. So I wanted to study these guys; I thought there was something remarkable there. I had been working at the Michael Chekhov Acting Studio and one of the guys died of AIDS, which was a horrible experience. He died very isolated because he didn't want his family to know he was gay. This was disturbing to me. I went to the hospital to see the guy."

Michael shared his personal version of the Svengali fantasy, which soon turned into Lost Horizon: "He was a real gorgeous guy. I had thought he'd be a famous actor and I'd be his hypnotist. And here he was dying. He looked ninety years old. It was the sort of thing where you say to yourself, if there's any way I can help, I'd like to. I thought I might be able to teach people to meditate and use guided imagery; maybe I could teach people to use self-hypnosis. So I went to all the AIDS groups starting with GMHC. When I looked over their materials and listened to what they had to say, I began to think they were doing more harm than good. I heard things that were terrible!"

Ian Young: "Because this went against what you'd learned from hypnotherapy?"

Michael: "Yes. Totally against. People were encouraged to accept that their illness was terminal - which often led to more reckless behavior. And the support groups, instead of discussing what was good, what was working, were obsessed with symptoms, which just leads to hypochondria. There's a large body of work on this, starting with the Simontons. And Milton Erickson who was perhaps the most important hypnotherapist. So I went to a number of groups and I met Michael Callen and Michael Hirsch who were just starting the PWA Coalition. And Michael Hirsch had just given a talk at the Gay & Lesbian Community Center on how no-one was getting involved or trying to help. I told him, I've been trying to volunteer for about six months and have been very frustrated. Michael Hirsch told me, no-one here thinks much of hypnosis, you might as well be offering voodoo. He said, These people are afraid of everything, they're certainly not going to go to a hypnotist. But he told me about HEAL.

"In '87, I started leading meetings as a volunteer. They were very much like the meeting you heard tonight except we knew less. We acted as a social circle where we could talk and provide information in a safe environment. The idea of the meetings was to promote questioning. My idea was that just promoting questioning would promote self-empowerment. After a while, I became Executive Director of the group.

"The food project was a separate entity, probably our best program, quite extraordinary. It was initially called the HEAL Kitchen and then it spun off on its own as the Whole Foods Project. I was thrilled to be associated with it as most AIDS food projects provide comfort food that has very little nutrition or health value."

Bud Weiss: "And thousands of people every year die of malnutrition in the hospital, from eating only hospital food."

Ian: "Bud, how did you link up with HEAL?"

Bud: "As a social worker, I had worked with very disturbed kids and with street gangs. I worked in professional theater for a while, I taught psychodrama, and I was involved with hypnosis as a seminar director for the Milton Erickson Society. And I met Virginia Satir, an astounding woman, and through her, I became interested in cancer work. Eventually I spent some time with the Simontons in Texas and in a project based on their work and utilizing imagery and recognizing that dying was a way of living' cancer and so-called terminal diseases were a way of handling life stress. The Simontons had done a study of about 140 terminally ill patients; after five years they were all expected to be dead but instead, 70% of them were alive and 30% had no trace of cancer. They had been working on healing with their belief systems.

"Terminal illness is a legitimate way of killing yourself, and if the patient can get clear of that and start to image and see themselves getting better and contributing to life, they can recover. This learning has been around for a very long time. We create out existence and if we get clearer and clearer about it, we can make a difference in the world. But the cancer patients I was working with were older people in the world possible condition who weren't about to go on living. I was having to help the families to let go. Then AIDS came into the picture and I saw the same approach being used with AIDS that had failed with cancer! I thought, boy, here we go again! But I knew somebody had to be doing something different with AIDS and I had to find them. And when I walked into a HEAL meeting, I thought, Here it is."

Ian: "The first person I came across who had a different approach was Louise L. Hay, who has a Science of Mind background. And Science of Mind is based on the work of Phineas Quimby, who started out as a hypnotist. Later, through John Lauritsen, I discovered Casper Schmidt, who was a psychoanalyst and also did hypnotherapy."

Bud: "I was involved with Werner Erhard and Landmark. When I brought this material to Landmark, they were open to my being around with it because they respected me as a therapist; and they had experienced remission of tumors in large seminar groups and so on. But they would take AZT and are dead now"

Michael: "I spent a day with Larry LeShan, the father of mind/body medicine and I presented my AIDS material very carefully to him. He said it seems to make sense but he wouldn't do anything about it because he felt he was too old to be controversial."

Ian: "Hadn't heard of Bertrand Russell!"

Michael: "I took over as President of HEAL in 1992 and took HEAL in a new direction, challenging HIV and so on. I felt it would be irresponsible to know what we know and not do that."

Bud: "We talked about detoxifying the body, getting rid of parasites in a safe way and replacing them with good bacteria, then using antimicrotoxins, antibacterials, antifungals and anti-inflammatories - herbal substances, garlic, aloes, vitamins. Using green juices to deacidify the blood."

Michael: "Chinese medicine, Ayurvedic medicine..."

Bud: "But Herbert Benson, head of the mind/body group at Harvard, in his book Timeless Healing, gives you all the studies and concludes that 70% of all healing is mental. It's belief systems, with spiritual attitudes as the most powerful piece. And with AIDS, even more than with cancer, you have so many people whose lives don't make sense. When they get an HIV+ diagnosis, it's a perfect out. I keep seeing this over and over: they now can become martyrs."

Ian: "And the AIDS system reinforces that because once you become HIV+, all kinds of percs accrue to you, you're welcomed and accepted into a community. Again and again you hear 'I never knew how much I was loved until I got AIDS'."

Bud: "It's a cult of dying that supports the drug industry, which is not all evil people, they're just locked into a way of thinking that supplies people - more and more, poor people - with death."

Michael: "America has a youth cult. And in the gay culture, I noted that I could not find any models for elderly gay people. And I heard dozens and dozens of people talking about how there was nothing more pathetic than a lonely old gay man. And people were agreeing left and right with that image, the terrible plight of the isolated, broken-down older gay man. Such a strong anti-ageing feeling. I began to wonder if AIDS was a solution to that image.

"When all this started, I didn't have any thoughts about gay and straight. I was a child of the 60's. I was open and positive sexually. Now that I'm doing this work, people assume I'm a gay man with AIDS and I had to confront how I felt. And I was embarrassed about being a heterosexual! Just in the way people were treated. Because until then, I didn't know how we treated people. I'd never been subject to anti-gay hate. I never imagined something like that. Now suddenly people were treating me like that. I found I wasn't embarrassed that someone thought I was gay but I was embarrassed about how people were treating each other. How mean and how threatened they were. It was even worse if they thought you had AIDS. Even health professionals were scared. No-one can describe discrimination to you; you have to experience it. Ironically, on the other side people were saying I was telling gays not to take AZT because I hate gays and want them to die!"

Bud: "Robert Bly, in his book The Sibling Society, talks about the real loss of connection between fathers and sons, and mothers and daughters, and between grandparents and grandchildren. And a lot of the gay movement is an attempt to make up that link and really reclaim that and become devoted to one another. But there's no culture to support the reconnection. And so many men become disillusioned that it isn't happening and their lives become a meaningless search. The fantasy of a family is another attempt to create community. There's a desperation that things aren't working. You've really tried, you've risked everything, you've come out of the closet and what you want is still not available. And when the disease is presented, it's a way out. Parades are really an intense attempt to create community. For Gay Pride Day, the community is instantaneously created and there's a sense of belonging."

Michael: "I also began to learn about AZT and it occurred to me that AZT might well be causing pneumocystis pneumonia. I remembered the experience of prophylaxing against syphilis in the bathhouses; it appeared to work because it masked the symptoms of syphilis. So people would not be aware of their infections because the antibiotics masked them. So I thought that something similar might be going on with people taking Bactrim and AZT. The appearance would be that it was helping, but maybe instead it was only masking. Michael Callen believed in prophylaxis but failed to notice that all his doctor's other patients were dead. So I thought, is the doctor's treatment special or is Michael one of those unusual humans who can tolerate any treatment? He hated that."

Discussing the power of beliefs to affect people, Michael talked about the role of "trance logic" in hypnosis and post-hypnotic suggestion.

Michael: "In hypnosis demonstrations, people will eat an onion believing it to be an apple and experiencing it as an apple. When you bring the person out of the trance, in almost every case, they insist they weren't hypnotized and are shocked to see their actions on film. One hypnotist did an act called Moontalk. He hypnotized three people very quickly and told one he was an emissary from the Moon who could only speak Moontalk. The next was told he was the only person on Earth who could interpret Moontalk, and the third was told he'd be skeptical but polite. So the first person begins speaking total gibberish. The second person translates elaborately and the third person shakes his head. Afterwards, when they're asked how they could speak Moontalk, they say they studied it in school or their family used to live on the Moon or everyone speaks Moontalk on TV. So I began to see examples of trance logic.

"These are all parts of hallucinations. And there are two kinds of hallucinations - positive hallucinations where you see things that aren't there, and the more dangerous negative hallucinations where you don't see things that are right in front of you. And I noticed that many people I was showing evidence to (evidence that HIV doesn't cause AIDS for example) couldn't see what I was showing them. And I recognized trance logic. So many of them were hypnotized! And people can be very imaginative and creative in their trance logic. A couple of other hypnotists figured out the same thing for themselves - Jeremy Selvey of Project AIDS International is one."

Ian: "When you tried to discuss information with people and they don't even see it and pretend it's not right in front of their faces, what conclusions did you come to about why this was happening? How had they been programmed not to see these things?"

Michael: "The most common answer apparently has to do with the New York Times! I would ask, what would it take for you to look at this? They would say: if it was in the New York Times. So I started writing letters to the Times, calling them up, asking them especially about their contention that AIDS is always fatal. I'm probably just as vulnerable about my beliefs and just as fooled by them in other areas of my life. I just happened to luck into seeing something. I had a window. Winston Churchill said the average person often trips over the truth many times in his life but quickly gets up and continues on. I realized I was in a situation where I was stumbling on the truth. I was in the right place at the right time. And I couldn't ignore it or do nothing about it.

"Casper Schmidt predicted that AIDS could end around 1997 but that it was being artificially stoked, that there was a manipulation going on. But you know, sometimes a person says 'I came into this, it scared the hell out of me, but now I've taken charge of my life and health. I've fired my doctor and am responsible for myself.' And that can be very empowering."

Ian: "At some point the lightning has to strike. It might strike you but at least it illuminates the landscape so you can see it for the first time. Then if you're still alive you can pick yourself up and turn things around."

Michael: "And hypnosis is really the art of turning things around, the art of language."

Ian: "What about those who recover?"

Michael: "There are a lot of good stories. Usually, once people get back to health, they disappear. A few come back occasionally. But what happens is everyone leeches onto them. How many bowel movements do you have a day? What do you eat? They develop these little groups that they don't want. Others regain their health and go back to partying. And I notice that some people that I've admired over the years, who took charge of their lives, who stopped obsessing over T-cells, who didn't have any health challenges and could tell you why HIV didn't cause AIDS, as soon as viral load and protease inhibitors were introduced, they took the test, started taking inhibitors and stopped coming to HEAL. One woman said to me, 'It's easier to take the medicine than to fight with my doctor'."

Bud: "People get a shot of terror. They mobilize themselves to survive. But survival is not enough. It's only the first step. You've got to move outside yourself and be concerned with your community. That's why organizations don't work. They're only into survival, to survive no matter what! They'll kill in order to survive."

Michael: "To me, a crisis really means a turning point. It represents the opportunity for greatness. So I began to say, this is not the point of no return, it's a turning point. HEAL is experimental. If something doesn't work, we drop it. I don't want a following. In every other group you see hours and hours devoted to loyalty. To me it's insulting. If people go out saying Michael said..., they're missing the whole point. I want them to go out and say I think."

When I left Michael and Bud, I thought about a story Michael had told me. Members of HEAL were sharing information about how to heal their KS lesions. Some were trying shark cartilage, some vitamin C preparations in aloe gel, others urine therapy. Many of them put bandaids on their lesions to protect the applications. There was also one wiseguy who just wore a bandaid and didn't use any medication at all. His lesion went away just like the others'. Was it the power of suggestion, the notorious placebo effect? What, then, are the limits to the incredible power of the mind?

Michael Ellner's book Quantum Focus, on creative healing and states of excellence, is available through HEAL, PO Box 1103, Old Chelsea Station, New York, NY 1103.

For some time, the magic word on everyone's lips in "the HIV Positive community" has been "Cocktail." Many HIV+ people are being prescribed the popular medicinal combinations, even more are desperate to get them, and everyone is talking about them. Though the official terminology suggests something rather devil-may-care in a martini glass, with an olive and a paper umbrella, a Cocktail also signifies the joining of cock and tail, i.e. a sexual union. It can even replace sexual union: many of the men taking the Cocktail are rendered impotent.

These medicines are not drinks but capsules combining various conventional nucleoside analogue drugs (DNA chain terminators such as AZT and its surrogates) together with varieties of the newest official AIDS treatment, protease inhibitors. The Inhibitors (there is a growing list of them as Abbott, Merck and Roche patent their own varieties) ostensibly target a particular class of enzymes by interrupting the assembly of viral proteins. This process is supposed to prevent "the virus that causes AIDS" from infecting new cells. The problem is that when tested in humans, the Inhibitors had no beneficial effects. But the manufacturers were undeterred. Thus was born the Cocktail - new, useless, drugs combined with old toxic ones.

Some people have been unable to endure the Cocktails or have succumbed to heart attacks after taking them. Others have developed severe gastro-intestinal problems, diarrhea, vomiting, diabetes, wasting limbs or other unpleasant physical oddities with names like "crix belly" and "buffalo humps." Nevertheless, TV and the rest of the mass media have concentrated on a flurry of accounts of spectacular, almost immediate recoveries. There are stories and compelling video evidence of KS lesions going into remission, pneumonias quickly clearing up, and people rising from their death beds and returning to their tennis games. Recovering the ability to play tennis has been mentioned, for some reason, by several enthusiastic reporters. Perhaps they are thinking of Arthur Ashe, the most prominent heterosexual said to have died of AIDS (as long as Magic Johnson remains reluctant to take his place).

Among the skeptics is the longtime student of protease Dr. David Rasnick. Rasnick doubts that protease inhibitors can do HIV+ people any good. As the Inhibitors must be taken for life, Rasnick suggests that over the long term, they will inhibit essential intestinal enzymes, preventing the absorption of nutriment from food. (Inhibitors fed to animals apparently cause their guts to shrivel.) "No drug on its own has worked in AIDS," he says, "so they're hoping that by throwing it all together in one big ball, something or the other will have an effect."

What, then, is happening here? Is it possible that protease inhibitors may be toxic over the long haul, but initially beneficial to some seriously ill people? Perhaps. But it seems to have been largely forgotten that phenomena similar to the current positive accounts about protease inhibitors accompanied the introduction of Wellcome's AZT, its surrogates from rival manufacturers, and Sandoz/GeneLabs' less widely distributed GLQ223 ("Compound Q").

As each of these drugs became the treatment of choice for a wide range of HIV+ people, its mass prescription was heralded with a flurry of claims and corresponding accounts of spectacular benefits. These phenomena diminished somewhat as large numbers of patients found they could not "tolerate" the drugs, as side-effects became more widely known, as independent tests failed to confirm, or contradicted, initial claims, and as patients failed to recover their health or, after an initial rally, died. Even so, the assertions and expectations surrounding each of the drugs, have not disappeared, but rather been subsumed by claims for new combinations of products.

(The much-televised baboon bone cure offered a variation on a theme. Remember the baboon bone cure? Everyone wanted it after Jeff Getty, the handsome young man on the evening news, revived so quickly, refreshed in body and spirit. From coast to coast, gay men demanded that baboon bones be made widely available. Angry activists clamored for monkey-marrow. They insisted on it as their basic civil right! And then - the treatment failed; even the experimenters admitted it: the baboon cells were completely rejected. The patient thrived anyway and is still alive. The treatment was discarded. No money in baboon bones.)

Just because a drug is discredited does not mean it is no longer prescribed. It is merely combined with other, hopefully more effective, drugs. Product combination ensures that each drug company retains its share of the market.

Another characteristic of the Cocktail has been the stringent accompanying instructions regarding self-administration. Patients are told that it is absolutely essential that they take their cocktails at regular intervals during the day ("the cocktail hour"), and never miss a dose. Should even one dose be skipped, "the virus," which is as clever as it is deadly, will seize its opportunity, and all previous doses will be rendered ineffective. (In California, the fetish of the regular dose is so strong that San Franciscos's Director of Public Health, Dr. Sandra Hernandez, has proposed the practice of "D.O.T." - directly observed therapy: enforced, closely monitored medication.)

Like the host and the communion wine, the Cocktail must be consumed regularly; the regularity is no less important than the consumption as an act of faith and obedience guaranteeing salvation. For the person diagnosed as HIV+, the Cocktail's scientific combination of host and wine replaces holy communion with sacred consumption.

The meticulous dosing schedule is not a new phenomenon. In the early days of AZT, the little blue and white capsules bearing the silhouette of a unicorn came in a Micronta Drug Timer, a plastic box with a loud alarm that sounded like a truck backing up (Dr. Robert Gallo had likened getting HIV to "being hit by a truck"). This device went off every four hours, day and night, and recipients of the drug were warned that it was essential not to miss a dose. Thus, AZT users were never allowed to get a good night's sleep. As many men simply turned off the timer, or ignored it, or threw the drugs away, the rules were later changed. This, it seems, was forgotten, severe regimens were re-introduced, and once again had to be modified.

AZT monotherapy was virginal; traditionally, the unicorn is attracted by chastity. But in combination, its significance changes with the terminology; it becomes more eroticized, more appealing. Even so, the relentless schedule of the Cocktail (more pills to take than ever before) still encountered the same strong resistance as the earlier AZT monotherapy. In a consumer society, people are eager to find salvation in a pill. (Thomas Szasz said that many people would rather take a medicine that kills than no medicine at all.) But it seems we want a single pill, one that doesn't keep us up at night or consume our life.

Consumers can be demanding, and manufacturers are rushing to meet those demands. The new Cocktails are New! Improved! Easier to Take! And once one is taking them, one must never stop, on pain of death. The Cocktail is the perfect product; as Oscar Wilde said of the cigarette, it leaves one totally dissatisfied.

The Cocktail is the elixir, the Grail, of the Positive Lifestyle. All medicines have a sacramental component and drug consumption is almost always ritualistic. Any medicine endowed with the magical rejuvenating properties claimed for the Cocktail will engender a powerful placebo effect. Only the Inhibitors and Terminators embedded in the Grail (i.e. its substance, its materiality) undermine its promise of salvation.

In his seminal 1984 paper, "The Group-Fantasy Origins of AIDS," Dr. Casper Schmidt drew attention to a number of outbreaks of hysterical or iatrogenic illness that were initially, and incorrectly, diagnosed as infectious. But illness is not the only phenomenon to be affected by mass trance and group-fantasy. Recovery is also susceptible to the same shared mental factors. Attitudes to sickness and disability are easily affected by the unconscious wishes, beliefs and fantasies of patients, physicians, care-givers and social groups.

During the 1970's and 1980's, a breakthrough in communicating with autistic and severely retarded people was widely heralded. Application of a simple new technique known as Facilitated Communication resulted in people who had never communicated before suddenly being able to convey complex, sophisticated thoughts, often in well written sentences and paragraphs. The Facilitated Communication technique consists of assisting mentally (and often physically) impaired children and adolescents by holding and supporting a wrist or forearm while the child's fingers indicate letters on a keyboard or printed chart.

Once these previously unresponsive youngsters were "facilitated," many expressed their frustration at their plight and their love for their parents and caregivers. "FC" was promoted as a revolutionary technique demonstrating that whole groups of people previously thought to have severe learning difficulties were actually suffering only from neuromotor impairment. Acceptance of FC spread rapidly as parents and teachers welcomed a technique that allowed them for the first time, to enjoy communicating with their children. FC quickly became a social movement as autistic people (accompanied by their paid facilitators) were integrated into regular schoolrooms and apparently semi-comatose people earned university degrees.

Under the sway of FC, psychologists and speech pathologists revised their diagnoses, physicians altered their prescriptions, IQ test results were scrapped and program recommendations were tailored to accord with new "facilitated" findings. And a raft of new career possibilities opened up in the fast expanding field of FC. Some skeptical voices were raised, but few people wished to play the role of "wet blanket."

Then something ominous began to happen. Until this point, the messages that disabled FC clients were tapping out on their computers and letter-boards had largely been charming, childlike poems or poignant descriptions of love and frustration. Now, first in just one or two places, but soon spreading rapidly across North America, the nature of the messages began to change. The facilitated children and adolescents began, en masse, to allege horrendous sexual abuse by family members (and sometimes others) - usually recounted in explicit, pornographic detail.

As the new rash of messages proliferated, school and program administrators, physicians, social services and police agencies became involved. Charges were laid, families were broken up, and everyone involved was subjected to a long, horrendous ordeal.

Eventually, the whole business collapsed. Rigorous testing revealed that test subjects' apparent recognition even of cards showing single letters or simple pictures ceased once the facilitators were prevented from seeing the cards. Testing was extensive and varied; the results were the same. Like the users of a Ouija board, the facilitators were communicating without knowing it. And their benign, unconscious group fantasy of love and communication had turned into a malign, equally unconscious group fantasy of mass sexual abuse.

FC is still used, and taught, in some American institutions; all manner of rationalizations are employed to justify it. But the technique is discredited, and the bubble has burst.

How does this relate to AIDS treatment? Dr. Gina Green, an expert in the fields of autism and mental retardation, has made a careful study of the Facilitated Communication phenomenon. Observing that many novel treatment techniques share similar characteristics and surrounding phenomena, she has suggested nine components of novel treatments that, she believes, often combine to "make up the structure of what might be considered a social movement." Though these components were developed from her study of Facilitated Communication and other treatments for the developmentally handicapped, she has remarked that "parallel phenomena occur in other areas, such as treatments for AIDS..." (Even some of the terminology is identical: novel techniques in both fields are called "interventions," suggesting benign intrusion into an otherwise unalterable state or process.)

Here are Dr. Green's nine characteristics of "treatment as a social movement."

1) Assertions that a new technique produces remarkable effects are made in the absence of solid objective evidence, or what little evidence there is becomes highly overblown.
2) Excitement about a possible breakthrough sweeps through the communities of parents, teachers, service providers, and others concerned with the welfare of individuals with disabilities.
3) Eager, even desperate for something that might help, many invest considerable financial and emotional resources in the new technique.
4) In the process, effective or potentially effective techniques are ignored.
5) Few question the basis for the claims about the new treatment or the qualifications of the individuals making them.
6) Anecdotal reports that seem to confirm the initial claims proliferate rapidly.
7) Careful scientific evaluation to determine the real effects of the technique are not completed for some time, and can be made more difficult that usual by the well-known and powerful effect of expectancies.
8) Some of these techniques have small specific positive effects, or at least do minimal harm.
9) Eventually they fall out of favor, sometimes because they are discredited by sound research, sometimes simply because experience reveals their lack of efficacy, but probably most often because another fad treatment has come on the scene. Each retains some adherents, however, and some go relatively dormant for a while only to emerge again.

Dr. Green's suggestion that her characterizations are relevant to AIDS treatments seems well taken; every one of her categories could be applied to currently popular AIDS drugs. The whole story of Facilitated Communication illustrates how powerfully expectation and group fantasy can influence the therapeutic process. If we believe autistic children are enraged at their abusive parents, they will tell us precisely that. If we believe gay men are destined to die young, we will contrive, quite unintentionally, to bring it about.

Both conditions - autism and HIV Positivity - are generally regarded as intractable, causing frustration, depression and burnout in caregivers. Cures are desperately needed. In both situations the initial benign results of new therapies have been followed by more disturbing effects. Like Facilitated Communication, AIDS combination therapies fit Dr. Green's criteria of a "social movement." In addition, their sacramental nature invests them with a key role in the cult phenomena surrounding AIDS and the Positive Lifestyle.

One acquaintance of mine, a "long term survivor," offers his rule of never taking any proposed new treatment for at least a year or eighteen months after it has come into general use. He finds that very often, after that prudent wait, the fad has passed, many of the enthusiasts have either died or moved on, and yet another lucrative new treatment is making its much-heralded debut.

Bibliography

Conlan, Mark Gabrish. "Protease Expert Dr. David Rasnick" in Zenger's, November, 1996.
Farber, Celia. "AIDS, Words from the Front - The Year in Hype" in SPIN, Vol. 12, No. 10, January, 1997.
Green, Gina. "Facilitated Communication: Mental Miracle or Sleight of Hand?" in Skeptic, Vol. 2, No. 3, 1994.
Rasnick, David. "Inhibitors of HIV Protease Useless Against AIDS" in Reappraising AIDS, Vol. 4, No. 8, August 1996.
Schmidt, Casper. "The Group-Fantasy Origins of AIDS" in John Lauritsen and Ian Young (eds.), The AIDS
Cult: Essays on the Gay Health Crisis, Provincetown, Asklepios, 1997.
Young, Ian. "Thinking Positive: The AIDS Cult and Its Seroconverts" in The AIDS Cult, ibid

Copyright @ Ian Young, 2000.

Published by
TMW Bibliographies
2483 Gerrard St. East
Toronto, ON, Canada M1N 1W7
iyoung@arvotek.net

Cerlox-bound copies of this bibliography are available for $30 each from the author at the address below. Cloth-bound copies of The AIDS Dissidents: An Annotated Bibliography (Part I, 272 pages, covering publications issued before 1993) are available for $35 (U.S.) from Scarecrow Press, Rowman & Littlefield, 4720 Boston Way, Lanham, MD 20706.

Other books available from TMW Communications:

• William Bory. Orpheus in His Underwear. The only book by the poet Edmund White called "the American Cavafy." 93 pages.
• Mark Chester & Ian Young. Lions in the Stream. Photo & poem, folded broadside. $5.
• Dennis Cooper. Idols. A few copies left of the first (and only complete edition) of this poetic classic. 80 pages. $20.
• Judith Crewe. The Ancient & Other Poems. Canadian lesbiana. 62 pages. $10.
• Kenneth Hopkins. The Dead Slave & Other Poems of Martial. 16 pages. $10.
• E.A. Lacey. Later: Poems 1973-1978. 96 pages. $10.
• John Lauritsen & Ian Young (eds.) The AIDS Cult: Essays on the Gay Health Crisis. 224 pages. $15.
• Wayne McNeill. Angels Have No Hearts. Poetry, 24 pages. $10.
• Wayne McNeill. Lola: Excerpts from the Notebooks of an Angelophile. Prose poetry, 8 pages. $8.
• Jay Shakley. The Villars-Manningham Papers & Other Stories of Sherlock Holmes. Introduction by Cameron Hollyer. $10.
• Ian Young. Sex Magick. Poems of sex & sorcery. 86 pages. $10.
• Ian Young. The Stonewall Experiment: A Gay Psychohistory. How we got from Stonewall to AIDS in twelve years. 312 pages, $25.
• Ian Young (ed.) The Male Muse: A Gay Anthology. The classic anthology of gay poetry. 127 pages. $20.
• Ian Young (ed.) Son of the Male Muse. An anthology of leading gay poets, 192 pages. $20.
• Joanne Young. Nuclear Family: One Woman's Confrontation with Atomic Power. A personal exposé of the dangers of nuclear technology. 113 pages. $10.

IMPORTANT

Prices are in Canadian dollars for customers inside Canada, in U.S. dollars for customers outside Canada. All prices include postage. Feel free to resell at your own price.

Please make all cheques payable to Ian Young, 2483 Gerrard St. East, Toronto, ON, Canada M1N 1W7.

TORONTO

tel/fax:(416) 406-HEAL

INDEX

Search our web site (400+ pages)

Site search Web search   search tips