John Beldekas on African Swine Fever Virus and Gallo's peculiar "discovery" of HHV-6
In August, 1986, John Beldekas was invited to go to the NCI and
present his findings on the link between ASFV [African Swine Fever
virus] and AIDS, which he did. Beldekas gave samples of all his lab work
to Gallo. Later, the government asked Beldekas to turn over all his
reagents and lab work to the government, which he did. Beldekas had
found ASFV presence in nine of 21 AIDS patients using two standard
procedures. At the meeting, Gallo was reported saying: “we know it is
not ASFV.” How could Gallo know this as he hadn’t done any of his own
tests to look for ASFV?
Two months later, Gallo published an article in Science (Oct 31,
1986) that he discovered a new possible co-factor in AIDS, a virus he
called Human B Cell Lymphotropic Virus which he named HBLV. Like ASFV,
HBLV infected B cells and also lived in macrophages. Did Gallo steal
Beldekas’s ASF virus he found in AIDS patients and rename it HBLV? Later
on, when Gallo found that HBLV could also infect other immune cells, he
changed the name of HBLV to HHV-6. Eventually, Gallo identified his
HBLV as the variant A strain of HHV-6 and called it a human herpesvirus.
--Mark Konlee
http://www.keephopealive.org/report10.html
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