Facing facts about HIV and AIDS

A black man called Mweetwa Muleya has been jailed for seven years for the crime of deliberately infecting two women with HIV.  Muleya had unprotected sex with both women, but failed to tell them that he was HIV positive.  Both women have now been tested positive for HIV, and one of them has said it has ruined her life.

It is fair to point out that both women appear to have consented to sex, and it is also fair to point out that sex can have such consequences as  pregnancy, chlamydia, gonorrhea, genital herpes, and syphilis.  Contraception reduces the likelihood of pregnancy, and barrier contraception reduces the likelihood of infection, but no method of contraception eliminates risk altogether.

However it is also fair to point out that Muleya's prosecution and conviction is founded on some very dubious science.  This quote is from Wikipedia:

The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is a lentivirus (a subgroup of retrovirus) that causes HIV infection and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). AIDS is a condition in humans in which progressive failure of the immune system allows life-threatening opportunistic infections and  cancers to thrive.

There is however a lot of debate on this topic, although this debate is rarely if ever given coverage in the national press.  Here are some of points of contention.

HIV may not actually exist.

HIV - even if it does exist - may be unconnected with AIDS.

HIV test procedures vary from country to country.

Even if HIV exists, and even if tests are accurate, then the HIV test indicates the presence of an antibody, suggesting that the person is no longer at any risk.

AIDS is a syndrome rather than a disease, and so cannot be diagnosed in the way a disease can be.  A person who is diagnosed as having AIDS may well be ill, but the illness will often be something identifiable like pneumonia or dysentery.

Many doctors are unwilling to diagnose someone as having AIDS unless that person is HIV positive, which is tantamount to concocting evidence.

AIDS may not exist at all in Africa, even though some scientists think it may have originated in Africa.

In short, it can be argued that a person who is HIV positive may or may not have a chemical in his body which may or may not be an antibody to a virus which may or may not exist, and which may or may not be connected to a medical condition called AIDS which may or may not exist.

Since the 1980s, successive British governments have happily assisted in perpetuating the belief that some people are HIV positive and that some people have AIDS.  I can only wonder how many people have had their lives quite needlessly blighted as a result.