The Chaos Within - Big Bang or Adam & Eve

Where did HIV come from?

Last week was DISHA's training week.

The question of HIV's origin had never really occurred to the team, until Pramila, my Nutrition Supervisor, asked me if its true that HIV was an infection that came to us from a Chimpanzee.

Before I begin, I would like to direct readers of this blog to http://www.avert.org/origins.htm to read about the origins of HIV/AIDS… and although I have written about some of this stuff before, what follows are some thoughts about theories (hard cold facts) that seem to surface again and again in our work.

At the Limuru Conference in January, Rev. Dr. P Mohan Larbeer from the Tamil Nadu Theological Seminary, Madurai presented a paper that included the hypotheses that 1) the HIV virus was created by the CIA - a sort of biological weapon- that primarily targeted people of African origin, or 'black' people, and of course, homosexuals; and 2) That Western Scientists working for Pharmaceutical companies not only created the virus, but also have the answer... it wasn't very clear whether that answer was a cure, or a vaccination, but they are sitting on it, because there is Zillions to be made through the manufacturing of ART/ARVs!

Being a brat in the HIV/AIDS field, this was the first time I had heard these theories, and I was aghast! My first reaction was that it was bullshit! I stood up and thanked Mohan for his 'provocative' presentation and commented that if what he was saying even had a semblance of truth, then all that we at the grassroots do to fight HIV/AIDS is futile... the conspiracy or onspiracies will never be overcome!

Mohan's presentation - there are books on these theories, and they not written by your average conspiracy theorists that believe Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones went undercover with the real MIB as part of 'the method' - may be conjecture at best, but it did make us think about the industry that is HIV/AIDS.

But, if HIV was created by white Western scientists in a great underground labyrinth of laboratories in some obscure little town in middle America, like Nashville Illinois, where the American Government has teams of scientists working on devious-anyone-who-is-not-white-and-Christian-and-straight-and-married-decimating-weapons of mass destruction, then they fucked up. Because as we say on the DISHA project HIV/AIDS does not discriminate... white, black, yellow, green, red, it does not care what colour you are! Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Jedi, it cares not about your creed. Gay, Straight, Transgender... It will infect you if it can... if you allow it to.

Another theory I heard quite recently was that homosexuals created it. Repeated anal sex somehow gave birth to the virus.

This appears to be a popular hyopothesis in Pune.

Added onto this is that HIV is God's post-modern curse on all those homosexuals and the promiscuous, regardless of sexual preference. In the beginning, well, circa 4000 BC, he dealt with them by raining down sulphur; on Sodom and Gomorrah for instance (heavy rains for 40 days and 40 nights, and waiting for the sewers to back up - according to Bill Cosby - hadn't really worked back in Noah’s day), and in the 70's (first case of HIV was probably in 1959) he decided HIV was the way to go. Why the 70's? Flower power and free sex was at its zenith. Dates help corroborate the facts! If the faithful, like Pastor Patricia Sawo contracted it, then that's just part of the collateral damage that this transcendent all powerful being is so accepting of.

The scientists - those who apparently do not work for the American Government’s WMD programme - search for an answer, and they should. Understanding HIV’s origin will help us fight it. And the AVERT site sheds light on how far they have got.

But for me, at the grassroots, the frontlines of the battle, debating about the origin of HIV/AIDS with those who do not want to think past ‘where did it come from?’ is much like debating the origin of humanity, the world and the universe, as we know it.

Did God conjure up the universe, and choose the ‘third rock from the sun’ to create a species in his own image, and endow man with free will, and give him dominion over (some read ‘responsibility for’) all creation, or was there a unimaginatively named ‘Big Bang’ that determined our beginning?

I really don’t care… even as a Christian I didn’t. Be it that Adam came from clay, and Eve from one of his stolen ribs, or be it that humanity began its journey as an amoeba, we are here now, and we have to live! Life is a gift. Be it from God, be it from my mum and dad. Also, all this horror of existence vs. the horror of non-being means little to me. We do exist. We just have to make sure we live.

HIV is here. It may have been through zoonosis, and if it was, I do hope they find a way to beat it… but concerns with HIV’s origin must in no way take away from the battle ahead of us; the people who are HIV+ , their families, all of whom need our support and love; the STIGMA that is so insidious and preys upon so many of us.

The blame game, the pointing of accusing fingers, the looks of disgust – all these often take precedence over actually preventing the spread of infection, and caring for those who are HIV+. I have sat with seemingly intelligent and compassionate people who are so caught up with the origin, or how someone contracted it, that they are ironically less concerned with the continuous rate of infection and the person who is HIV+.

We have also been told, more than once, the last time was yesterday, that we're merely prolonging life, and increasing the chances of infection, i.e., an HIV+ person is necessarily an agent of infection. Just let them die.

Again, on the project we drive home that HIV is not end to life. HIV+ people do not have to merely suffer the rest of their existence. They can live!

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So, go, read about the possible origins of HIV/AIDS, satisfy your curiosity, and then come help us fight this battle. We cannot do it alone. We need you to be HIV Positive.