Since the early days of the AIDS epidemic, many bizarre and dangerous hypotheses have been advanced to explain the origins of the disease. In this compelling book, Nicoli Nattrass explores the social and political factors prolonging the erroneous belief that the American government manufactured the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) to be used as a biological weapon, as well as the myth's consequences for behavior, especially within African American and black South African communities.
Contemporary AIDS denialism, the belief that HIV is harmless and that antiretroviral drugs are the true cause of AIDS, is a more insidious AIDS conspiracy theory. Advocates of this position make a "conspiratorial move" against HIV science by implying its methods cannot be trusted and that untested, alternative therapies are safer than antiretrovirals. These claims are genuinely life-threatening, as tragically demonstrated in South Africa when the delay of antiretroviral treatment resulted in nearly 333,000 AIDS deaths and 180,000 HIV infections—a tragedy of stunning proportions.
Nattrass identifies four symbolically powerful figures ensuring the lifespan of AIDS denialism: the hero scientist (dissident scientists who lend credibility to the movement); the cultropreneur (alternative therapists who exploit the conspiratorial move as a marketing mechanism); the living icon (individuals who claim to be living proof of AIDS denialism's legitimacy); and the praise-singer (journalists who broadcast movement messages to the public). Nattrass also describes how pro-science activists have fought back by deploying empirical evidence and political credibility to resist AIDS conspiracy theories, which is part of the crucial project to defend evidence-based medicine.
1 of 1 copy available
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Creators
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Publisher
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Release date
March 20, 2012 -
Formats
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Kindle Book
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OverDrive Read
- ISBN: 9780231520256
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EPUB ebook
- ISBN: 9780231520256
- File size: 2808 KB
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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December 5, 2011
In this important book, Nattrass, an AIDS expert at Yale and Cape Town University, deftly examines widespread misconceptions about the origin, transmission, and health effects of AIDS. She compares the situation in South Africa, where AIDS denialism was institutionalized at the highest levels of government (leading to 333,000 unnecessary AIDS deaths), with a host of conspiracy theories circulating in the United States. Nattrass frames her thesis cogently: “The important issue here is not whether the ‘AIDS as genocidal bio-weapon’ claims are wrong (which they are), but rather why they were, and remain, thinkable for many people.” She asks the same question about other equally erroneous beliefs such as that HIV is harmless. Her analysis focuses on four symbolic figures responsible for promoting misinformation: the hero scientist (a dissident scientist taking on the medical establishment), the cultropreneur (someone hawking alternative and unproven therapies), the living icon (a person claiming to be living proof that AIDS cannot cause harm), and the praise-singer (a journalist who promotes the antiscientific view of the disease). The ways in which the scientific community has challenged each of these figures should help inform future scientific debates, such as the one over vaccines, which, as Nattrass so well demonstrates, is where the battle between science and myth is very similar. -
Starred review from February 15, 2012
Nattrass (economics, Univ. of Cape Town) here exposes the antiscience consequences of AIDS denialism and AIDS conspiracy theories. By claiming that HIV doesn't cause AIDS, denialists undermine HIV prevention work and cause more infections among adherents by influencing them not to take precautions against HIV. Thousands died in South Africa when President Thabo Mbeki advised citizens not to take antiretroviral drugs. Nattrass describes the strong social components of AIDS denialism, which typically centers on four players: the hero scientist (e.g., denialist Peter Duesberg), the "cultropreneur" (e.g., those who exploit HIV patients by condemning antiretroviral medicine and selling herbal remedies instead), the living icon (HIV-positive people who offer themselves as proof that HIV doesn't cause AIDS), and the praise singer, such as those who produce films praising the denialism. VERDICT Focusing mostly on the United States and South Africa, this book is readable and compelling though written in a scholarly style. A remarkably well-argued case against unscientific approaches to AIDS and a brilliant defense of evidence-based medicine. A must-read for all who study AIDS history.--Jeffrey Beall, Univ. of Colorado at Denver Lib.
Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
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