AIDS cured!.... or not

[ori]

CNN is late in reporting this - by a few weeks as usual
Gambia's president is a quack and a dangerous one at that. The problem is not his "cure" which simply won't work, but this part of his procedure (Source)

"The Gambian leader requires patients to cease their anti-retroviral drugs (ARVs), a move that risks weakening their immune systems and making them even more prone to infection," said Dr Antonio Filipe, head of the World Health Organisation in Senegal.

What he offers them is a herbal tea and some bananas which he claims he has scientific evidence that it will cure AIDS if they don't use proven medication - oh and for his evidence:

But the Senegalese hospital contracted to handle the test results of Jammeh's nine "recovered" patients has rubbished his conclusions. "There's no baseline," says Dr Coumba-Toure Kane. "You can't prove someone has been cured of Aids from just one data point. It's dishonest of Gambia's government to use our results in this way."

Jammeh retaliates: "There are bound to be sceptics. Mine is not an argument, mine is a proof... I can cure Aids and I will."

If Jammeh has found a cure for Aids, he must share the secret with mankind - and update his CV where, under Special Skills, it says he can cure epilepsy and asthma, but nothing about Aids.

My favourite account of this is from a German magazine from a few weeks ago (Spiegel online)

Now he has gone a step further. A few weeks ago, Jammeh summoned his followers and a few ambassadors, dignitaries and TV reporters to announce in a garbled address that, having made some fantastic discoveries, he is now capable of curing AIDS (as well as asthma). The president admitted to his astonished audience that the therapies still had a few limitations -- he could only cure AIDS on Thursdays. Asthma, on the other hand, could be treated only on Fridays and Saturdays.
(...)
International aid organizations are horrified to find that thousands of infected Gambians are hoping to be treated by the president. Jammeh says he'll heal anyone, young or old. He won't take payment, but he does make one stipulation: those who are taking anti-viral medication must stop doing so immediately. Two respected HIV/AIDS experts promptly handed in their resignation in protest.

Dressed in white from head to toe, the head of state stands before his patients, mumbling prayers and waving the Koran. Then Jammeh rubs green glop on their skin, sprinkles them with gray liquid from an old Evian bottle and gives them something yellow to drink. Bananas -- administered orally -- round off the treatment. After repeating the procedure for several weeks, he proclaims the patients healed. All of them. Without exception.
(...)
Jammeh explains that the method, based on the healing properties of seven herbs and Koranic prayers, is "foolproof." While he prefers to perform the healing sessions in public in front of TV cameras, he's willing to grant religious and social dignitaries private audiences.

Critical questions, on the other hand, are not welcome. A British correspondent from the Sky News network suggested Jammeh ought to have his method tested by independent experts. The president snapped back at her: "I don't have to convince anyone. I can heal AIDS and don't have to explain anything." He was visibly flustered by her request to analyze a sample of his herbal mixture. "Not in a million years," was his reply.
(...)
A United Nations representative in Gambia dared to assert that there was no proof of successful healings. She also cautioned the supposedly cured patients not to believe that they're no longer capable of spreading HIV.

President Jammeh responded promptly to these remarks: having branded the UN representative persona non grata, he gave her 48 hours to leave his country -- which she did. In the view of the Daily Observer, her comments had been "irresponsible".
(...)

 

[Yoda Power]

What economic growth? There is no real economic growth that would meet the needs of growing population. It wasn't there even before AIDS first appeared, so you can't blame AIDS for their lack of economic competence.

Growing population is the problem of Africa. It is actually a huge problem, both economic and humanitarian. Since they're obviously unable to use contraception and limit it by the less inhuman ways, mother nature needs to use the time-proven way - disease.

If AIDS kills off a part of the surplus, it will give them time to adjust.

I can blame AIDS for some of their lack of economic competence. Stating that AIDS does not affect the economy, when such a high percentage of the population is infected it's simply wrong.

What it really comes down to is this: Does the population explosion result in less economic growth? Or does less economic growth result in population explosion?
Fact is, that both are somewhat correct, and that's why Africa is stuck in such a bad situation, an evil circle if you like.

However removing one of the factors that contribute to the bad economy will be an improvement, and will not necessarily mean that the population growth rate increases further.

 

[FredLC]

What I don't get is why experts are spending time being "horrified" instead of studying the herbal remedy.

It's because they lack people to do that. Everyone is tied up analyzing the underwater-breathing pill formula that was handed to me by the ultra-advanced bullsnake pig space explorers from Ursa Major.

Now, seriously - I'm hoping the deal here is just that I am way too thick to get your sarcasm, Narz.

Regards .

 

[woody60707]

Is it an election year or something there?

 

[Azash]

Tell him that.

I call Zola's Horse.

OnT: It makes you think of two things:

A. Is the placebo effect really that effective?

B. If an AIDS cure would be so simple, would the science commnity be able to accept it?

 

[Narz]

It's because they lack people to do that. Everyone is tied up analyzing the underwater-breathing pill formula that was handed to me by the ultra-advanced bullsnake pig space explorers from Ursa Major.

Now, seriously - I'm hoping the deal here is just that I am way too thick to get your sarcasm, Narz.

Regards .

No, I'm serious.

Even if this herbal remedy doesn't "cure AIDS" (which I imagine it doesn't), it still may have properties than help ease the suffering of the people.

I am certain placebo effect accounts much of it's healing powers but you can't simply discount offhand that it might do something, at least now without studying it.

 

[FredLC]

No, I'm serious.

Even if this herbal remedy doesn't "cure AIDS" (which I imagine it doesn't), it still may have properties than help ease the suffering of the people.

I am certain placebo effect accounts much of it's healing powers but you can't simply discount offhand that it might do something, at least now without studying it.

This opinion is well-heartened, but I'm afraid, misplaced.

I'm not one to deny that simple medicine can work, sure. Many modern medicine was based on cures from herbal healers, which, after researched, were proved to have working active principle. They too, after all, learn from experience.

The same goes for placebo effect, which is proven to work (though never cured aids, nor anything really serious).

However, this case is entirely different. We are not talking about primitive medicine being brought to the attention of researches - we are talking about a guy pulling a formula out of his ass, and using his access to executive power to replace proven retroviral medicine for it - all without any history of success, except a few scarce and highly untrustworthy testimonials.

Even in the way off chance that this does work against aids better than retroviral drugs (or that it works against aids at all), the manner through which this thing is being used is, indeed cause for indignation of the researchers, and in fact, for anyone who cares for these lives which are at stake.

Regards .

 

[Narz]

I'm not defending the way things are being done.

Just saying it may be worthy of study (though possibly not).

 

[FredLC]

Not exactly. You said you didn't understand why the experts were appalled. I'm saying that it was for a very good reason.

Regards .

 

[Chandrasekhar]

Doesn't it say in the article that these people won't let Western scientists study it?

 

[Nylan]

Sheesh, it's not like inventions and cures haven't been discovered completely by accident before! This might be a good thing. Try to be optimistic, will you?

Take Lorenzo's Oil for example (and don't try to throw any of that logical fallacy stuff at me )

 

[Bill3000]

Sheesh, it's not like inventions and cures haven't been discovered completely by accident before! This might be a good thing. Try to be optimistic, will you?

Take Lorenzo's Oil for example (and don't try to throw any of that logical fallacy stuff at me )

Apparently they didn't teach you the scientific method in school.

 

[Harbringer]

So If I, tomorrow, having no idea of even the slightest concepts of biology just said eat this paper, it will cure you of aids, would you be "optimistic" and believe me? I wouldn't, so why should some random guy pulling a cure out of his ass be any more credible than another random guy pulling a cure out of his ass?

Not to mention, have you read the method, they eat bannanas and recite some words while rubbing brown goo on eachother, you cant take something like that seriosuly at all, theres a reason indian dances didnt work to cure disease.

 

[amadeus]

It's capitalism. The pharmacutical companies don't want a cheap, readily available cure made in some African country. They don't care about curing Aids, all they care about are profits.

And Martians killed JFK. Get real.

 

[Nylan]

Apparently they didn't teach you the scientific method in school.

Apparently they didn't teach you that the scientific method doesn't always work.

It's not like things haven't been invented without the scientific method, it's not like things haven't been stumbled upon that were great miracles either.

 

[Bill3000]

Apparently they didn't teach you that the scientific method doesn't always work.

It's not like things haven't been invented without the scientific method, it's not like things haven't been stumbled upon that were great miracles either.

In the past 200 years? No, not really.

 

[Mercenary82]

Why not give this guy the benefit of the doubt? Maybe his cure does work.

 

[Chandrasekhar]

Why not give this guy the benefit of the doubt? Maybe his cure does work.

Meanwhile, people are dying because they're using his unproven cure over the proven treatments that we're giving them.

 

[ori]

Why not give this guy the benefit of the doubt? Maybe his cure does work.

I sincerely hope so - for one reason: thanks to the WHO and UNAIDS work (which included proven therapies and education on AIDS prevention) there is one of the African nations with the lowest AIDS/HIV rate (about 1.2% of the population) - now that their despot can cure AIDS I fear he'll throw out all UNAIDS and WHO workers who still want to help in a way that actually works. If that happens the AIDS rate will explode there as well.
The fact that he refuses to allow foreigners to test or analyze his brew and that there is yet no scientific evidence that even one patient has been cured don't bode well for his people though.

 

[Eukaryote]

Well, it sounds rediculos but it's worth a try.