Experimental oral polio vaccines and acquired immune deficiency syndrome

Abstract

The simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV) of the common chimpanzee is widely acknowledged as the direct ancestor of HIV–1. There is increasing historical evidence that during the late 1950s, kidneys were routinely excised from central African chimpanzees by scientists who were collaborating with the polio vaccine research of Dr Hilary Koprowski, and sent – inter alia – to vaccine–making laboratories in the USA and Africa, and to unspecified destinations in Belgium. While there is no direct evidence that cells from these kidneys were used as a substrate for growing Dr Koprowski's oral polio vaccines, there is a startling coincidence between places in Africa where his CHAT vaccine was fed, and the first appearances in the world of HIV–1 group M and group–M–related AIDS. Because of the enormous implications of the hypothesis that AIDS may be an unintended iatrogenic (physician–caused) disease, it is almost inevitable that this theory will engender heated opposition from many of those in the scientific establishment, and those with vested interests.