PostTV

The Ultimate "Constant Gardener" Scandal The Origins of HIV/AIDS Film

Here's an important controversial film about the so-called OPV ("oral polio vaccine") theory of the origins of the AIDS epidemic, a disease that has already taken more than 26 million lives, with more than 100 million premature deaths in the next 50 ears --  now infecting, for example,  more than 5.5 million people in South Africa alone, where it is killing more than 1000 people per day.

This 2003 (poorly-distributed/ legally-threatened)  film built on 20 years of investigative reporting and "upstream swimming" against the scientific community by Edward Hooper, a courageous British journalist. Hooper contends that the disease was actually man-made,  originating in polio vaccination trials by scientists like Dr.Hillary Koprowski and Dr. Paul Osterrieth, who were rushing to perfect their own polio vaccine.

With the help of local chiefs, the vaccines were compulsory for more than 1 million people in the Congo and Burundi from 1957-60, which may have used chimpanzee tissue  as a "substrate" for tissue cultures, in the production of the vaccines.

Hooper's 1999 book The River started this controversy. Contrary to popular mythology, the controversy continues unresolved to this date.

This spring, researchers claimed that HIV had been traced to chimps in the Cameroon, supposedly predating the OPV trials and lending support to a "bushmeat" theory of the virus' origins.   However, Hooper has raised several important criticisms of this theory, including its failure to explain the concentration of early HIV/AIDs cases in the Congo, quite far from Cameroon; the low incidence of HIV in Cameroon; and the prospect that Cameroon-type chimps had turned up in the 1950s Congo camps.

Since the original vaccines employed in the Congo trials have all somehow disappeared, we may never get to the bottom of this controversy. All we can be sure of is that this one lone journalist  has certainly succeeded in making the orthodox scientific community very uncomfortable.

Interested readers are referred to Hoopers' website for the latest developments.

origins of aids
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Bolivia's Growing Regional ConflictJames S. Henry and Donald K. Ranvaud

The new year is already off to a turbulent start in Bolivia. During the week of January 7 to 15, up to six thousands supporters of President Evo Morales' MAS party-- mainly cocaleros from the Chapare coca-growing region,  campesinos, and indigenous groups --  showed up in Cochabamba,  Bolivia's third largest city of 800,000,  in the country's center. 

They had come to demand the resignation of Cochabamba's   right-wing Governor, Manfred Villa-Reyes, who has become an outspoken supporter of the "autonomista" movement,  which is seeking greater "states rights" for the country's nine provinces -- especially the wealthier, "whiter" eastern and southern provinces of Beni, Pando, Santa Cruz, and Tarija, where most of Bolivia's natural gas and richest farms are located.

As shown in this exclusive video footage from Cochabamba (See Parts I and Part II). shot by Bolivian film crews working under the direction of  our colleague, award-winning Hollywood producer Donald K.Ranvaud (The Constant Gardener, City of God, Central Station, etc.), the MAS supporters encountered a fierce reaction from the city's middle-class residents and pro-autonomista forces, including a crowd of more than well-organized thousand stick-waiving people who reportedly attacked the cocaleros and campesinos aggressively on January 13th. In the ensuing conflict, at least two people were killed and more than 150 were injured.

By Saturday January 14th, calm had returned to the city. Governor Manfred returned from Santa Cruz, where he had apparently fled out of concerns for his own safety, and  Evo Morales also returned from Nicaragua, where he had been attending Daniel Ortega's inauguration. Steps have been taken on all sides to pacify the situation.

However, as we'll discuss below, the potential for renewed conflict is very high. This is not only because none of the fundamental economic and political causes of the conflict have been addressed. It is also because on all sides,  Bolivia's political leaders have not exactly shown the capacity for compromise and the maturity that will be essential to avoid a "lose lose" outcome for Bolivians of all backgrounds and social classes.