Originally posted by Jean Paul Zodeaux
It is ironic that you would ask I provide you with links or sources to verify my claims, and you offer up this tidbit without any link or source to back it up. Consider this.

HIV controllers exhibit potent CD8 T cell capacity to suppress HIV infection ex vivo and peculiar cytotoxic T lymphocyte activation phenotype
Some rare HIV-1-infected individuals, referred to as HIV controllers (HIC), have persistently undetectable plasma viral load in the absence of therapy. This control of HIV-1 replication has been associated with a strong, multifunctional specific CD8+ T cell response. However, no direct link between this immune response and the control of viremia has so far been provided. We investigated parameters of specific CD8+ T cell response and in vitro susceptibility to HIV-1 infection in 11 HIC. We found high frequencies of HIV-specific CD8+ T cells.

In contrast to CD4 cells, people with HIV often have elevated numbers of CD8 cells, the significance of which is not well understood.

Lab reports may also list the T-cell ratio, which is the number of CD4 cells divided by the number of CD8 cells. Since the CD4 count is usually lower and the CD8 count higher than normal, the ratio is usually low in people with HIV. A normal T-cell ratio is usually between 0.9 and 6.0. The expected response to effective combination anti-HIV treatment is an increase in CD4 count, a decrease in CD8 count, and an increase in the T-cell ratio.

All I was trying to say was that isn't it quite the coincedence that the first man to say HIV causes AIDS was also the same man who thought HIV caused leukemia at first? Especially when we factor in the "special virus cancer".

Again. How does that counter what I said about CD8+ T-Cells being more proliferent in HIV positive people?

Actually, when HIV is first introduced into the system there is an "abnormal increase of blood cells" called CD-8+ T-cells which attack the infected CD-4+ T-cells.

Remember AIDS is a syndrome. Not an illness or a virus.

The first stage of HIV, known as the primary or acute infection, is the most infectious stage of the disease, and it typically lasts several weeks. During this phase, the virus replicates rapidly, which leads to an abundance of the virus in the bloodstream and a drastic decline in the number of CD4 T-cells. The CD8 T-cells (cells that kill abnormal or infected body cells) are then activated to destroy HIV-infected body cells and antibodies are produced. An estimated 80-90% of HIV patients experience flu-like symptoms during this stage.

Following initial infection with HIV, the rapid emergence of cytolytic T-cell responses, largely CD8+ T-cell responses, is associated temporally with a decrease in plasma levels of HIV.(21) CD8+ T cells may help control HIV replication in several ways.

HIV disease progression correlates with increased proportions of highly differentiated CD8+ T-cells, which exhibit characteristics of replicative senescence and probably indicate a decline in T-cell competence of the infected person.

The point about viruses is that when a person is infected with chicken pox, measles, the common cold or influenza, the virus acts the same in all instances, but not so with HIV. This is an anomaly that brings up valid questions.

I guess you missed where I stated that the antibody test is the first test. After you test positive for the antibodies, you go through many tests that actually identify the VIRUS. they can even tell you which type of HIV you have.

PROBLEMS WITH ISOLATING HIV How can we best help Africa? How can we set priorities aimed at bringing under control what is described as an AIDS epidemic? For twenty years, all AIDS research has been based on the HIV hypothesis. Do we now have reasons to question this hypothesis? Yes, because there is a major problem with isolation and purification of HIV. The major problem being that, in spite of innumerable claims to the contrary, this retrovirus has never been isolated nor purified in a scientifically acceptable manner that would satisfy the classic requirements of virology.

The authors of these studies concede that their pictures reveal the vast majority of the material in the density gradient is cellular contamination. HIV expert Hans Gelderblom of Berlin's Robert Koch Institute, whose photos of non-banded 'HIV' material have been the industrial benchmark since 1987, co-authored the first paper which describes the contamination as "an excess of vesicles" - particles of cellular proteins, that may contain DNA or RNA. In a consecutive paper, a U.S. research team from the AIDS Vaccine Program in Maryland reveal carefully, "It is unknown how these cellular proteins associate with the virus" and warn, "The presence of microvesicles in purified retroviruses has practical implications". Both teams discuss the resulting nonspecifity of HIV tests, all of which are based on early unchecked "purified HIV".

Isolation is the only direct and unambiguous evidence of a virus, and isolation of a virus from the uncultured plasma of a patient is the only proof that a person has an active viral infection. Cultures are artificial laboratory environments that contain replicating microorganisms or cells.

Normally, true isolation can be achieved without difficulty as people with an active viral infection will have lots of viruses in their plasma. This is not the case with HIV. In fact, there is no evidence that anyone has ever found what is called HIV in fresh plasma. Instead, AIDS researchers are only able to find what they call HIV when plasma or immune cells (co-cultures) and stimulating chemicals are added to cultures. Since artificially stimulated cultures can induce viral DNA to produce viruses even when the patient's plasma contains no virus, finding virus under these circumstances does not constitute evidence that patient plasma contains virus. True virus isolation requires using fresh, uncultured plasma.

The only way to prove the existence of a virus is to isolate its particles. It is only by doing this that we obtain pure particles to inspect, and analyse, and to introduce into fresh cell cultures to prove particles make more of the same. After all, no matter how viral-like they may look, this is what particles must show us before they ever earn the title, virus.

Have HIV experts gone to all this trouble? No. The only reason we have HIV is antibodies. A few antibodies amongst the plethora in AIDS patients that react with a few proteins present in the lymphocyte cultures of AIDS patients. When it is all said and done, it’s not just that antibodies are used to prove some individuals are infected with HIV. For the HIV protagonists, antibodies are the proof that they have isolated HIV.

At the IFAS Satellite Meeting held at PALEXPO, in the evening of Sunday June 28th a team of scientists in Perth, Australia, led by Eleni Papadopulos, bio-physicist and chairwomen of the Board of Scientists of IFAS demonstrated that to date there has been no isolation of the "human immunodeficiency virus" ("HIV"), according to the scientifically approved standards and steps for retroviral isolation: a) Purification through density gradient banding, b) Identification of the banded material using electron microscopy and c) Introduction of pure particles into a virgin culture and, by repeating the above steps, showing that identical particles are produced.

None of the so-called "HIV-markers", biomedical or genetic, seen in human subjects labelled "HIV positive" and/or having "AIDS" has been known to be specific for "HIV".

The definite existence of any virus, including a retrovirus, can be proven only by isolating it. For nearly half a century retroviruses have been isolated by banding in density gradients. It is accepted that the procedures incorporated into this method, which is by no means perfect, have not been followed by the researchers who claim isolation of the human immunodeficiency virus, HIV-1. Nonetheless, it is said that at present, there is ample evidence that HIV has been isolated and shown to be a unique exogenous retrovirus.(1) In this critique we have analysed the relevant data that purport to prove that HIV has been isolated. To simplfy the presentation for readers of this article, the major arguments (1) for HIV isolation are used as the headings in the discussion. Since the topic is both complex and controversial it is necessary to present substantial original data and sometimes to repeat it in order to critically assess the basis for the view that HIV has been isolated.

The authors of both papers concede that the particles which are present in the banded material and which are said to be HIV represent only a very small fraction of the total material. Gelderblom et al. state that the material contains "an excess of [cellular] vesicles with a size range 50-500nm, as opposed to a minor population of virus particles...cellular vesicles appear...to be a major contaminant of HIV preparations enriched by sucrose gradient centrifugation".

You may recall a flurry of media hoopla a month ago over some dramatic *disneyworld* images of "HIV" attacking a Tcell. These reports are more like the fuzzy footage supporting UFO sightings and either fall apart under scrutiny of are impossible to substantiate.

"The pictures of the virus that have appeared around the world are artists' impressions and computer simulations, based on indirect observations by molecular biologists, not isolation of the virus itself," points out Neville Hodgkinson.