AIDS Origin Theory: Polio Vaccine? - AIDS Treatment News

AIDS Origin Theory: Polio Vaccine? - AIDS Treatment Newsby John S. James
Published: March 20, 1992
In March 1992 two separate theories have been published suggesting
that AIDS may have been accidentally introduced into humans by live-
virus polio vaccines which may have been contaminated with unknown
monkey viruses. These theories are more plausible than most of the
AIDS-origin ideas which have come along. But they are still
speculative; the evidence only suggests that it is possible that AIDS
started this way, not that it actually did.
Important articles about the polio-vaccine theory have appeared
recently in ROLLING STONE, THE LANCET, and THE HOUSTON POST. Instead of
restating the points they made, this article will provide annotated
references, so that readers who are interested can go to the original
sources.
"The Origin of AIDS," by Tom Curtis, an 8,000-word article in the
March 19, 1992 ROLLING STONE, suggests that an oral polio vaccine used
in over 300,000 people in the Belgian Congo (now Zaire) in the late
1950s may have transmitted an unknown virus which may have been present
in monkey kidney cells in which the polio virus was grown during the
making of the vaccine. Use of this vaccine was apparently discontinued
in 1959, after Albert Sabin, M. D., developer of the polio vaccine in
most widespread use today, reported that an unidentified virus had been
found in it. No known monkey virus resembles HIV-1, but there are
believed to be many unknown monkey viruses; it is possible that a virus
close to HIV-1 exists but has not been discovered.
"Simian Retroviruses, Poliovaccine, and Origin of AIDS," by Walter
S. Kyle, published in THE LANCET, March 7, 1992, suggested that AIDS
might have been transmitted to the gay community in the United States by
use of the Sabin live-virus oral polio vaccine as a treatment for
herpes, before the development of acyclovir. This use was suggested by
A. Trager, in at least two articles published in 1974. The vaccine was
given orally (the same way as when used for prevention of polio, but
apparently in larger doses), once a month for three months only.
Several published letters, in English, German, French, and Hebrew,
discussed this use of the Sabin vaccine.

More here.