AZT before giving birth - higher incidence of cancer

Here's a CNN article which is titled 'Company to offer AZT at steep discount to Third World'

http://cnn.com/HEALTH/9803/05/azt.discount/index.html

In the article, it says that the company that makes AZT (Burroughs Wellcome) will be selling it cheap to Thailand (and other countries) soon, because if a pregnant woman takes it for 3 weeks before pregnancy, it reduces the transmission of HIV by 50%. What it doesn't say is that there is only about a 25-30% chance of the virus being transmitted anyhow, and that is no guarantee of AIDS development anyhow. In the US, this has been done for 3 years, and it costs the woman 800 to 1000 dollars. The price per treatment in the 3rd world (sorry for using this nasty term--any suggestions for replacements?) will be US$70. Interesting, the company says they will still make a profit, which suggests that they are really getting a lot of money off AZT, and are seeking to expand their markets.

There are about half a million HIV+ people in the US, and an estimated 21 million worldwide. As of 1996, AZT (almost exclusively sold in US and EU) had a cumulative sales of US$2.5 billion (that's $2,500,000,000). If AZT worked and was safe, that would be one thing. At those profits, I would be suspicious anyhow. If AZT could save lives for people with such a nasty disease as AIDS, is it ethical for the company to charge so much? It's even more for gay HIV+ men, who take it every 4-6 hours, for the 3 or so years they usually live after beginning 'treatment.' But AZT isn't safe.

There is a great article which attempts to document the fraud involved in the FDA research which led to AZT, an off-market chemotherapy agent designed to kill cancer by only half-killing the patient. Here's the URL, check it out.
http://www.duesberg.com/jlfraud.html

There's plenty of other challenging stuff out there on AZT and AIDS.
http://www.trufax.org/menu/aids.html

To stick to the 'mainstream,' there was another mouse study which showed that mice whose mothers were treated with AZT before giving birth had a much higher incidence with cancer half way through their life. Now, they say that the amounts were so much higher than they'd give to humans, and that it's really safe, so don't get excited.

Check out the article at http://cnn.com/HEALTH/9711/04/azt.babies.cancer/index.html

Animal research is a terrible thing, and it is not applicable to humans, really. Other animals are not like humans, and the assumption that they are has led to countless pollutants and pharamaceutical deaths. Remember thalidomide?! Here's a great article on animal research fallacies:
http://home.earthlink.net/~supress/fraud.html

So they've been giving AZT to mothers in the US for 3 years, and the study showed that mice got cancer at mid-life when their moms were given it at birth. Yet they claim that it's not going to be a problem when these kids are 30 or 40. So they're going ahead and promoting it for profit in nations where most people can't afford it. (US$70 is almost the annual wage of the average Chinese or Thai citizen, especially after the 'Asian Economic Crisis'). AZT has tremendous side effects, and HIV=AIDS is an exaggerated claim at best.

In Thailand now, the question is more of malnutrition and water. More babies need more food, and there is hardly enough food (or money for it). If people are dying of malnutrition, poor sanitation, etc. and will be more in the near future, reducing the HIV mother/child transmission rate from 30% to 15% seems like a waste of time and money, especially given the dubious history of AZT research and the possibility that even mainstream media covers the mouse children getting cancer angle.. Especially since Thailand is a launch pad to the poorer nations. Mentioned as targets are Uganda, the Ivory Coast, Vietnam, and others. I've got my own opinions on what's going on, but I think you can make your own based upon the above info.

The UN is supporting this exploitive profiteering, and no one (yet) is being heard speaking against it. If someone can show me that the initial research on AZT was indeed good research, and that it is a safe, much needed medication, then I suppose I'll reconsider condemning the whole operation. But since there is fair documentation of FDA covering up and altering the original research, I think it would take another long, well-done human study to vindicate the drug. My effort to help out and get to the bottom of this is to share this information, so please pass it on if you find it interesting. If you would like to publish this information, please contact me and I will work to make it more thoroughly documented for print.

Kevin O'Neil Healios@imagina.com

Tweet