by Jon Rappoport
April 4, 2016
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The interview, conducted by excellent freelance journalist, Christine Johnson, delves into these questions:
How should researchers prove that a particular virus exists? How should they isolate it? What are the correct procedures?
These questions, and their answers, reside at the heart of most disease research—and yet, overwhelmingly, doctors never explore them or even consider them.
Johnson interviews Dr. Eleni Papadopulos, “a biophysicist and leader of a group of HIV/AIDS scientists from Perth in Western Australia. Over the past decade and more she and her colleagues have published many scientific papers questioning the HIV/AIDS hypothesis…”
I strongly suggest you read the whole interview. Here I’m publishing and highlighting excerpts. Technical issues are discussed. Grasping them is not the easiest exercise you’ve ever done, but I believe the serious reader can comprehend the vital essentials.
CJ: Does HIV cause AIDS?
EPE: There is no proof that HIV causes AIDS.
CJ: Why not?
EPE: For many reasons, but most importantly, because there is no proof that HIV exists.
…
CJ: Didn’t Luc Montagnier and Robert Gallo [purportedly the co-discoverers of HIV] isolate HIV back in the early eighties?
EPE: No. In the papers published in Science by those two research groups, there is no proof of the isolation of a retrovirus from AIDS patients. [HIV is said to be a retrovirus.]
CJ: They say they did isolate a virus.
EPE: Our interpretation of the data differs. To prove the existence of a virus you need to do three things. First, culture cells and find a particle you think might be a virus. Obviously, at the very least, that particle should look like a virus. Second, you have to devise a method to get that particle on its own so you can take it to pieces and analyze precisely what makes it up. Then you need to prove the particle can make faithful copies of itself. In other words, that it can replicate.
CJ: Can’t you just look down a microscope and say there’s a virus in the cultures?
EPE: No, you can’t. Not all particles that look like viruses are viruses.
…
CJ: My understanding is that high-speed centrifugation is used to produce samples consisting exclusively of objects having the same density, a so-called “density-purified sample.” Electron microscopy is used to see if these density-purified samples consist of objects which all have the same appearance — in which case the sample is an isolate — and if this appearance matches that of a retrovirus, in terms of size, shape, and so forth. If all this is true, then you are three steps into the procedure for obtaining a retroviral isolate. (1) You have an isolate, and the isolate consists of objects with the same (2) density and (3) appearance of a retrovirus. Then you have to examine this isolate further, to see if the objects in it contain reverse transcriptase [an enzyme] and will replicate when placed in new cultures. Only then can you rightfully declare that you have obtained a retroviral isolate.
EPE: Exactly. It was discovered that retroviral particles have a physical property which enables them to be separated from other material in cell cultures. That property is their buoyancy, or density, and this was utilized to purify the particles by a process called density gradient centrifugation.
The technology is complicated, but the concept is extremely simple. You prepare a test tube containing a solution of sucrose, ordinary table sugar, made so the solution is light at the top but gradually becomes heavier, or more dense, towards the bottom. Meanwhile, you grow whatever cells you think may contain your retrovirus. If you’re right, retroviral particles will be released from the cells and pass into the culture fluids. When you think everything is ready, you decant a specimen of culture fluids and gently place a drop on top of the sugar solution. Then you spin the test tube at extremely high speeds. This generates tremendous forces, and particles present in that drop of fluid are forced through the sugar solution until they reach a point where their buoyancy prevents them from penetrating any further. In other words, they drift down the density gradient until they reach a spot where their own density is the same as that region of the sugar solution. When they get there they stop, all together. To use virological jargon, that’s where they band. Retroviruses band at a characteristic point. In sucrose solutions they band at a point where the density is 1.16 gm/ml.
That band can then be selectively extracted and photographed with an electron microscope. The picture is called an electron micrograph, or EM. The electron microscope enables particles the size of retroviruses to be seen, and to be characterized by their appearance.
CJ: So, examination with the electron microscope tells you what fish you’ve caught?
EPE: Not only that. It’s the only way to know if you’ve caught a fish. Or anything at all.
CJ: Did Montagnier and Gallo do this?
EPE: This is one of the many problems. Montagnier and Gallo did use density gradient banding, but for some unknown reason they did not publish any Ems [photos] of the material at 1.16 gm/ml…this is quite puzzling because in 1973 the Pasteur Institute hosted a meeting attended by scientists, some of whom are now amongst the leading HIV experts. At that meeting the method of retroviral isolation was thoroughly discussed, and photographing the 1.16 band of the density gradient was considered absolutely essential.
CJ: But Montagnier and Gallo did publish photographs of virus particles.
EPE: No. Montagnier and Gallo published electron micrographs of culture fluids that had not been centrifuged, or even separated from the culture cells, for that matter. These EMs contained, in addition to many other things, including the culture cells and other things that clearly are not retroviruses, a few particles which Montagnier and Gallo claimed are retroviruses, and which all belonged to the same retroviral species, now called HIV. But photographs of unpurified particles don’t prove that those particles are viruses. The existence of HIV was not established by Montagnier and Gallo — or anyone since — using the method presented at the 1973 meeting.
CJ: And what was that method?
EPE: All the steps I have just told you. The only scientific method that exists. Culture cells, find a particle, isolate the particle, take it to pieces, find out what’s inside, and then prove those particles are able to make more of the same with the same constituents when they’re added to a culture of uninfected cells.
CJ: So before AIDS came along there was a well-tried method for proving the existence of a retrovirus, but Montagnier and Gallo did not follow this method?
EPE: They used some of the techniques, but they did not undertake every step including proving what particles, if any, are in the 1.16 gm/ml band of the density gradient, the density that defines retroviral particles.
CJ: But what about their pictures?
EPE: Montagnier’s and Gallo’s electron micrographs…are of entire cell cultures, or of unpurified fluids from cultures…”
…
If you grasp the essentials of this discussion, you’ll see there is every reason to question the existence of HIV, because the methods for proving its existence were not followed.
Therefore, more questions emerge. How many other viruses have been named as causes of disease, when in fact those viruses have never been isolated or proved to exist?
Of course, conventional-consensus researchers and doctors will scoff at any attempt to raise these issues. For them, “the science is settled.” Meaning: they don’t want to think. They don’t want to stir the waters.
A few years ago, chemist David Rasnick sent a request to the CDC, asking for evidence demonstrating that the Ebola virus had ever been isolated from a human. The answers he received did not begin to approach a level of certainty.
After 30 years working as a reporter in the area of deep medical-research fraud, I’ve seen that false science occurs in levels.
The deeper you go, the stranger it gets. To put it another way: the deeper you go, the worse it gets.
Jon Rappoport
The author of three explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED, EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, and POWER OUTSIDE THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District of California. He maintains a consulting practice for private clients, the purpose of which is the expansion of personal creative power. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free NoMoreFakeNews emails here or his free OutsideTheRealityMachine emails here.
The abuse of sciences to control society is an ongoing anthropologic problem. Thank you for having the courage to use your talents to find and report on this issue.
HIV has known RNA sequences, in a number of variants. I’ve personally detected it a few times in RNA cancer samples using RNA-seq transcriptome analysis. This is the best virus test that exists. Most viruses contain RNA and can be detected with sequencing although there are a few gotchas to control for such as homopolymers and homology with the organism.
However HIV has neither of those and I’m confident I’ve actually seen the viral sequences in a handful of samples. Whether HIV causes AIDS by itself or is just coincident, I can’t say, but I have personally observed fragments of RNA that map to known HIV transcripts.
My feeling is it’s actually a genome specific bioweapon, which is why it’s extremely rare with caucasians yet some african nations have 60% infection rate. Watch “in lie we trust” by Dr Leonard Horowitz on youtube.
How is it possible to know that the RNA sequence that you detected belongs to HIV or any virus, for that matter? Seems to me that your test must be an indirect observation (given that HIV has never been directly isolated), and as such must be based on some kind of assumption or theoretical model.
HIV-1 sequence:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nuccore/9629357?report=fasta
@Dan
Are you fucking serious Dan…you provide a link to a page filled with theoritical nucleotides as proof that the virus exists. And I’m suppose to say what, “that’s way above me and I don’t understand it, so it must be true.”
Nice try slick,
Better still; since you have personally ‘detected’ it. Provide proof?
First off, science is not even sure what the story is, they can’t get the story straight…is a virus living?
Is it dead? Is it blue or is it red, can you tie it in a bow.
As a matter of fact, four nucleotides as the basis of DNA RNA is questionable to say the least Dan.
Admit it you can’t even prove that…
Are viruses common rogue short nucleotidic chains floating around in the environment, randomly looking for a bond?
Are they a life form? Are they dead matter? Are they distinctly the beginning of a lifeform?
Are they man made?
Are they an adjustment of nature, to correct itself in some way?
Are they the cause of evolution? the mutation of the norm?
Is it like thowing an extra Bingo number into the mix. And the variables extrapolate.
Do they even exist at all?
Nothing is known, all of this is 100% theory. Not a godam thing has been proved as yet.
No physical evidence of any of this, exists anywhere for any virus.
Letters on a page does not qualify as a micrograph.
Better still, a clear and distinct photographic image of the virus. A outrageous viral count within an infected petre dish from an infected HIV patient?
Viral images from that said petre dish; and from many infected individuals proving without a doubt that HIV EXISTS. And is causing the horrific breakdown of an immune system.
There is no grounds for the virus existing at all Dan. There never has been, it is all theory coming from a few experts. Smoke blown up the publics ass. Blowhards piping off a spin.
Do me favour and shut my big Irish mouth Dan.
Show me an image of the virus? Show me an image of the HIV virus. Show the damage being done.
Show it in many supposed HIVinfected humans?
No letters on a page.
Quote of the day: “It’s really not that theoretical.” -Dan
I could explain how short read sequencing works on Illumina platform but it would take a while. It’s really not that theoretical. It has a few limitations but it’s very accurate. The RNA and DNA fragments we’re working with are long enough that they’re unique and can be mapped to known reference genomes.
I haven’t looked into how HIV was isolated and sequenced for the link I provided, but it would be worth digging into.
Thanks Dan, I’ll look into it.
If Hiv wasn’t isolated then there is no way to know that the “known DNA sequence” actually belongs to HIV, or whether it is merely a genetic fragment or cellular debris from the rest of the unisolated culture.
The “science ” pretends to be on steps x y and z, when in reality they haven’t demonstrated completion of steps a b and c.
I’m not making a lot of assumptions, but I have seen EM pics of what people claim is HIV, and this material has been sequenced and found to have a specific RNA sequence. That’s about all I can tell you. Not saying it causes disease but my personal believe is there is a family of viruses (not just humans but primates and other species) that infects white blood cells, and that link above goes to the sequence.
Some people get very emotional about this. All I’m saying is I’ve seen RNA that closely matches “known” HIV sequences. Not saying it causes AIDS. When I’ve seen it, it also has been accompanied by hepatitis and other STDs.
The observation is a bit like microscopy, it denatures the nucleic acid chains and uses fluorescent chemistry to tag and image the bases one at a time, in clusters.
The technology is pretty good but not perfect. I dont know of any systematic errror that would randomly tell me I have HIV in my sample. That would be a bit of a stretch in my opinion to think it’s a false positive result. It’s detecting something, and that thing is believed to be HIV.
Cellular debris is not going to have the gene sequence of HIV.
This is what it’s supposed to look like:
http://www.histology.leeds.ac.uk/what-is-histology/assets/HIV_EM.gif
But maybe I will look a bit further into this because it’s quite interesting and there seems to be something very sinister wrt origins of the virus… like many viruses. We can’t take for granted where they originated or even if they are pathogenic.
Thabo Mbeki, President of South Africa until 2008, questioned the conventional position on Aids/Hiv. He stated that Aids brought about the collapse of the immune system but not because of a virus. He said the cause was poverty, bad nourishment and general ill health, and the solution was not expensive western medicine but the alleviation of poverty in Africa.
Where can I find Papadopulos’s alternative AIDS hypotheses which are mentioned in the interview but not discussed?
Try http://www.theperthgroup.com
Thanks!
> Charles – you can find Dr. Eleni Papadopulos at the “Perth group” website – use google.
Hi Jon – great to see more coverage on this. There are other interesting sources wrt aids and other so called viruses which include Dr Stephen Lanka, and the book “Virus Mania” which I may have mentioned in previous posts.
The basic premise that viruse particles have to be isolated in the first instance is key to understanding gross misconduct that the medical profession is guilty of.
There exists no proof that a complete pathogenic virus has ever been successfully isolated (whether by molecular sieve or by centrifuge) and biochemically characterised, photographed then used to re-infect disease free tissues and the process repeated.
The simple proof that is required is Primary and by direct observation! Definately not illustrated computer generated imagary! None to date has ever been shown to have been isolated by direct observation, characterised and repeated.
All the methods employed are by what is known as indirect methodology until the electron microscope is used which is the only direct part of the process but relies completely on the indirect processes to establish purity of the isolated material which is based on the ASSUMPTION of previously isolated precedent which is a leap of faith.
Not only are pathogenic HIV particles highly questionable but all other so called pathogenic viruses to date, with no directly observable evidence to back up the medical establishments claims.
Further questionable practices start to emerge once the gravity of error is fully understood. Genetics is one other such instance.
Hi Dave. I certainly think many viruses are imaginary, but do you really think that all of them are innocuous? What about Chickenpox?
Synchronicity here… I have just watched
Positively False – Birth of a Heresy – HIV AIDS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-iccGpFto8
This includes references to the Perth group and many others.
The Cancer Industry is another example – although I don’t jibe with the sentimental presentation and ‘marketing’ of Ty Bollinger I still recommend viewing the wide range of interviews he garnered for many dedicated witnesses from integrative and natural health practitioners along with survivors and authors. The series is to be reshown in a week or two – and his youtube has many snips from the interviews and much of what they say stands in merit.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCC0Ff6iAdp-D6p8Nj-59yYQ
My other recommendation on this only focuses on one doctor who has hung in where so far no one else has managed : Burzynski: Cancer Is Serious Business | Full Documentary
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBUGVkmmwbk
Jon, Luc Montagnier is the fraud that also “proved” (not) life spontaneously “popped into existence ands mutated” “affirming” the you-know-who’s.
By my analysis ALL viruses are [protein coated?] organic or inorganic matter (pollution). The science is by no means clear nor coherent.
Good work at attempting to define smoke & mirrors, as always, Jon.
Best
OT