July 22, 2002

REPLY TO THE PERTH GROUP BY HOWARD URNOVITZ

Anita Allen is a journalist from South Africa (and a columnist at RFW) who was introduced to me earlier this year. She expressed an interest in learning more about what I had to say about HIV and AIDS. I told her that I could not help her in her quest to bring the facts about the HIV/AIDS issue to either South Africa or the world. Allen informed me that she knew many if not all of the panel members assembled to assist President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa in understanding the role of HIV in AIDS. I looked at the panel membership, some being close friends, and concluded that not one individual was qualified to understand AIDS since none has published anything contributory to the field of regulatory genomics.

Let me explain what regulatory genomics is and why it is important for my reply. Everyone knows about the big hype associated with the multiple announcements in 2000 that the human genome was mapped. These announcements did not contain the whole truth. The truth is that it was mostly Craig Venter, the principal behind Celera’s major initiative, whose own genome was partially mapped. Celera and the US government, funded by taxpayers, mostly mapped the genes that make proteins. These genes are referred to as structural genes. The taxpayer got screwed, as did the Celera (NYSE: CRA) shareholders who bought the hype at $250/share (now $10/share), because the genes that CONTROL the structural genes are where the gold lies. These controlling elements are called the "regulatory genes." They remain incompletely mapped and poorly understood.

To help you understand the mind set of the human genomics community, these regulatory genes are commonly referred to in the literature as "junk genes." The name junk implies that not much is known about these elements. But in fact, the lexicon of regulatory genes is quite rich and includes things like: long interspersed elements, short interspersed elements, endogenous retroviruses, transposons, retrotransposons, Alu retroelements, short interfering RNAs, micro RNAs, snos, and microsatellites, to name a few. The study of the relationships between gene control and biological function is referred to as "regulatory genomics." Confused? We are talking about the human body. Many of us believe the beauty of life comes from its complexity.

The AIDS research community has completely ignored the field of regulatory genomics. In a letter to the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) last year, I suggested that their position that HIV is the sole cause of AIDS is substantially based on scientists studying complex mixtures of biological fluids with unknown numbers of regulatory genes and concluding that one big structural gene, HIV, is causing the syndrome. This is medical incompetence at its worst.

OK, back to the reply. The Mbeki panel included input from a group of scientists from Perth, Australia, who heroically challenged the position that HIV was the cause of AIDS back in the 1980’s when the epidemic was young and the circus performers were few. Allen would not take no for an answer in pursuing this little recognized area of regulatory genomics and published a piece at RedFlagsweekly in March 2002 that included a part of my work. She then was kind enough to copy me on her emails to the "Perth Group" alerting them to my work and asking them to look at my contributions to the field as they related to regulatory genomics. Allen sent them a copy of her article that focused on one aspect of my genomics work referred to as HERVs. The email she received back and forwarded to me stated that the Perth Group "would greatly appreciate any citations to Dr. Urnovitz's work where he presents data and argues that HIV is not an exogenous retrovirus, and AIDS not an infectious disease." I expected such a myopic reply and signed off to Allen with, "I told you so."

I find it amusing that the Perth Group has had the audacity to contact me via a public forum rather than directly with this obviously feeble attempt to discredit my public and scientific comments about HIV/AIDS. I find it rather pathetic that their only concern is that they receive credit in perpetuity for challenging the HIV story early on. OK, Perth Group--we got it. You are the dissidents and you "expounded" that HIV is not an exogenous retrovirus and a cause of AIDS. Big news then, old news now.

The Perth Group obviously has access to my papers. Their surgical removal of the sections that pertain to their world is truly a sign of a desperate plea for attention. Their selective avoidance of the discussions on the possible role of regulatory genomics in AIDS supports my position that the Mbeki panel consisted of scientific lightweights who are in total denial of the clues that could possibly move us to understanding how to control AIDS.

So I guess their main question for me boils down to: "What is your position on whether HIV is a exogenous retrovirus?" My answer is: You just don’t get it, do you? I clearly stated my position on this issue in my testimony to the US Congress and my letter to DHHS: There are not sufficient enough data to understand the properties of HIV because the scientific literature is nothing more than opinions, poorly conducted studies and reviews of poorly conducted studies.

Who cares about the semantics of whether the HIV structural gene marker is cellular or exogenous or once cellular and now exogenous or part cellular and part exogenous or any and all permutations and combinations of these two components? Why aren’t the Perthians reading about regulatory genomics and AIDS? Too hard to understand? Well, maybe they should not have been on the advisory panel if this is over their heads. The question to medical scientists remains, "What role does the HIV marker play in AIDS?" or better, "What is the true and total molecular basis of AIDS?" How hard is this? Obviously neither the International AIDS Circus Performers nor the Dissidents are in any position to answer these questions.

So, now my question to the Perth Group is:

Don’t you think it would be a better use of your time to assist in figuring out the underlying mechanisms in AIDS than to annoy productive scientists who contribute important, novel information to the medical database, which still does not acknowledge your two decade-old opinion?

These are truly dark times for science. The take home message from the recent Barcelona AIDS conference is that incompetent AIDS scientists and even more incompetent medical reporters are wasting lives and money while creating sanctions against medical breakthroughs by refusing to listen to anyone who questions their conclusion that HIV is the sole cause of AIDS. The one last hope that a sitting President, Mbeki of South Africa, could have changed the world of science forever is now dismally fading into a footnote in history.