Talk:Oral polio vaccine AIDS hypothesis

Untitled
I understand that wikipedia doesn't do "original research", but the article in Nature has a glaring assumption that the chimps came from that same area. If you consider the fact that they may have come from other areas, then the whole hypothesis that it debunks polio vaccine to AIDS is incorrect. I will admit that I am a novice on this subject, but it wouldn't be the first time that assumptions entered into "science". Signed Me

Up to date textbook source on OPV-AIDS "Tools for Critical Thinking in Biology" By Stephen H. Jenkins
Editor Gongwool has found an up to date textbook (2015) that provides a current view of OPV-AIDS. Four of the five pages relevant to OPV-AIDS (pages 217,218,219,226 & 305)are readable at Google books Page 218 is not readable there. In the chapter "Science as a Social Process", pgs 217-219 form a section titled, "Peer Review and the origin of AIDS", pg 226 is questions for students, and page 305 is "Bibliography". Curiously Worobey et al 2008, 'Direct evidence of extensive diversity of HIV-1 in Kinshasa by 1960' is not included in the bibliography.

Salient features of Jenkin's presentation:
 * Pascal's place in the history of OPV-AIDS is aknowledged. Jenkins, (pg217), "The tainted polio vaccine hypothesis for the origin of AIDS was initially developed by Louis Pascal, described by Brian Martin at the University of Wollongong in Australia as “an independent scholar . . . based in New York City.” "
 * Also aknowleged is that the OPV-AIDS hypothesis allows for chimanzee material to have been used in the production of CHAT. Jenkins, (pg217), "the hypothesis was modified to suggest that Koprowski’s team in the Congo had a chimpanzee colony as well as monkeys and used some material from chimps when they made polio vaccine.
 * On the disproof of OPV-AIDS Jenkins writes, (pg 218), "Although Hooper and Martin are still promoting the tainted polio vaccine hypothesis, recent genetic work has convincingly disproven it." Jenkins then presents the background and implications of Worobey et al 2008 then criticises Brian Martin saying BM, "simply mischaracterized Worobey’s argument as theoretical". Jenkins, (pg218) then writes, "The results of Worobey’s group that were described in a paper in Nature in 2008 were a smoking gun that caused all but a few diehards to reject the tainted polio vaccine hypothesis for the origin of AIDS, ..."

The current WP:OPV-AIDS article is at variance with Jenkins on: SmithBlue (talk) 23:50, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Pascal's place in the history of OPV-AIDS
 * the hypothesis' inclusion of chimpanzee material as the source of SIV.
 * the date from which all reasonable people rejected OPV-AIDS.

Appropriateness to include SV40
User:Alexbrn I suggest that a reference to SV40 has validity in this article as there is easily a lack of clarity between facts concerning SV40 and speculation on HIV that confuses the two in the minds of the public. Why was did you undo this addition as an "unsourced citation" when I included a link to the Wiki SV40 article? If that isn't sufficient as a citation, then add a citation from the Institute of Medicine's 2002 report which confirms that both IPV and OPV vaccines were contaminated with SV40, although the main risk was from IPV as the IOM only could confirm that 10,000 Americans in a OPV trial were exposed to SV40. Also can include a law review reference on SV40 which reports many more were exposed to SV40 world wide via OPV. Same argument re XMRV. However it was introduced into the human population, it was undoubtedly from laboratory work and is speculated to be vaccine related although it could have been by some other method and is documented in Wiki. As I suggested on another entry of mine you undid, if you don't agree with the citations then improve them rather than removing the edits in order to present an honest and accurate representation of historical and scientific fact rather than a POV.
 * UNDONE EDIT: Although a vaccine origin of HIV/AIDS has been only speculative, it is well documented that the early polio vaccines cultured from African Green Monkey kidney cells were contaminated with Simian Virus 40 (SV40). SV40 constitutes the first known instance of animal DNA insertion into the human genome. Xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus (XMRV) is another well known animal virus found in humans that is suspected of having vaccine origins.

SV40 IOM: https://www.nap.edu/read/10534/chapter/1

SV40 Law Review: Simian Virus 40 (SV40):A Cancer Causing Monkey Virus from FDA-Approved Vaccines. Michael E. Horwin, M.A., J.D. Albany Law Journal of Science & Technology, Volume 13, Number 3, 2003. Excerpt republished with permission: http://sv40foundation.org/CPV-link.html

On XMRV: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3109487/

Seabreezes1 (talk) 12:57, 5 July 2017 (UTC)
 * What exactly is the proposed content and source? Alexbrn (talk) 13:22, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

Should this really be called a hypothesis?
It’s been pretty thoroughly debunked. Purely the realm of conspiracy theorists. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DonkeyPunchResin (talk • contribs) 06:53, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I changed the title from "OPV AIDS hypothesis" to "OPV AIDS conspiracy theory". The concept of intentional creation of HIV is fringe, and to discuss this idea is either ignorance or misguided.  Blue Rasberry   (talk)  17:06, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I agree.--DonkeyPunchResin (talk) 01:34, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
 * The current title of the article "OPV AIDS conspiracy theory" is incorrect, in my opinion seriously. Consider the meaning of the word "Conspiracy": "the activity of secretly planning with other people to do something bad or illegal" (from https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/conspiracy). The main supporters of the theory have never claimed that Koprowski, the Wistar institute or anyone else intentionally contaminated the vaccines in order to spread the SIV virus. No conspiracy charges were made. Proponents of the theory have always supposed an involuntary medical error. Therefore, identifying this theory as "conspiracy theory" is something that alters the reality of the facts and evokes a misleading bias in the reader. In other words, it does misinformation.
 * I therefore propose that the title be changed to the clearer "Oral polio vaccine theory about the origin of AIDS", without using the acronym OPV in the title, because many people may not know it.--Marco491 (talk) 01:11, 19 April 2020 (UTC)
 * You are right that there is no conspiracy involved. But "theory" is out of the question. The reliability (and therefore respectability) scale goes theory > hypothesis > conjecture > speculation > conspiracy theory, and you want to jump from one end to the other. "Speculation" would probably be the right level. --Hob Gadling (talk) 06:27, 19 April 2020 (UTC)
 * There is actually a conspiracy. Of senior virologists to use bogus science to suppress the HIV/OPV.  But as the conspiracy has been successful, we cannot say so here. Tuntable (talk) 09:07, 5 July 2023 (UTC)

Do you know if there is a Wikipedia page or guideline that specifies the characteristics of each of the categories you mentioned? That is, to clarify what characteristics a "theory" must have to be associated with the right scale? Marco491 (talk) 10:23, 19 April 2020 (UTC)
 * No. I guess it is left to the authors and the reliable sources. But in science, as opposed to common usage, a "theory" is a very solid thing. Since this is a subject where scientists are the sources, scientific usage should be applied. --Hob Gadling (talk) 13:29, 19 April 2020 (UTC)
 * First I collected the meanings of the 4 words we are using:
 * 1-Scientific theory: "systematic ideational structure of broad scope, conceived by the human imagination, that encompasses a family of empirical (experiential) laws regarding regularities existing in objects and events, both observed and posited. A scientific theory is a structure suggested by these laws and is devised to explain them in a scientifically rational manner." (https://www.britannica.com/science/scientific-theory)
 * 2-Hypothesis: "an idea that proposes a tentative explanation about a phenomenon or a narrow set of phenomena observed in the natural world. The two primary features of a scientific hypothesis are falsifiability and testability, which are reflected in an “If…then” statement summarizing the idea and in the ability to be supported or refuted through observation and experimentation." (https://www.britannica.com/science/scientific-hypothesis)
 * 3-conjecture: "a guess about something based on how it seems and not on proof" (https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/conjecture)
 * 4-speculation: "the activity of guessing possible answers to a question without having enough information to be certain" (https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/speculation)
 * I agree to discard "Theory".
 * The main characteristics of "Hypothesis" are "falsifiability and testability", "ability to be supported or refuted through observation and experimentation". Here we enter a more subtle area. If it is stated at the beginning of the article that the scientific community has rejected the "theory" ("The journal Nature has described the hypothesis as "refuted""), then it means that the properties of "falsifiability and testability" exist, otherwise the above refusal would not have been possible. We cannot lower the level of "theory" to mere speculation and at the same time say that the scientific community has been able to prove its falsity.
 * The "conjecture" is based on the activity of guessing ("a guess about something"). It could be adequate, but the verb "to guess" in the common meaning seems to me more referred to something completely random, guess at random. The term does not seem to me entirely appropriate because in the specific case there were clues that could initially legitimize the "theory" (spatial coincidences (Congo), temporal coincidences (1957-60s), the presence of colonies of healthy SIV-bearing chimpanzees that could have been used to prepare the vaccine). So "guess" but not entirely by chance.
 * "Speculation": it is commonly used for topics of little importance (see the examples in the link I pasted). In this case the question was important, it was not a matter of mere idle talk. It was a matter of investigating the origin of the most serious epidemic in the world, to the point that Hamilton himself wanted to leave for the Congo in order to verify it. So it wasn't a useless question, so this term seems reductive to me.
 * In conclusion I propose the word "Hypothesis". In support of this, I also mention the following additional topics: a) Hypothesis is often used throughout the article, b) the article on Nature, mentioned at the beginning of the page (note 5) even calls it "Theory", c) the The Royal Society in an article (note 17) calls it "Hypothesis".--Marco491 (talk) 21:59, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

I moved the page to "Oral polio vaccine AIDS hypothesis" and explicitly clarified at the beginning of the article that the thesis is Not accredited by the international scientific community. Marco491 (talk) 10:16, 29 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Agree. "Hypothesis" is the correct term.  Tuntable (talk) 06:09, 24 November 2022 (UTC)

Did nobody ever mention that HIV and poliovirus are completely different?
HIV belongs to Ortervirales, poliovirus to Picornavirales. They are both RNA viruses, but that's it, right?

Just wondering. To me, a layman, that sounds like a very convincing argument, so I would have expected virologists to use it. --Hob Gadling (talk) 06:39, 19 April 2020 (UTC)


 * The degree of similarity between the two viruses has no bearing on the theory in question.--Marco491 (talk) 22:56, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
 * To clarify, the OPV hypothesis is not like the SARS-CoV-2 lab leak hypothesis. Nobody could genetically engineer viruses back in 1950s.  However, they bread viruses in tissue culture that was derived from primates, probably including Chimpanzees.  The meant that other, unrelated virus could come from the primates to the competed vaccine. Tuntable (talk) 06:12, 24 November 2022 (UTC)
 * I believe the misunderstanding arises from the fact that paragraph "Development of hypothesis" does not explain at all that the hypothesis is based on accidental contamination of the polio vaccine with SIV virus. In fact, I think that paragraph needs an improvement.--Marco491 (talk) 00:04, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Development of hypothesis
The "Development of hypothesis" section needs in my opinion to be expanded. In it, Curtis' article on Rolling Stone is mentioned, but his thesis was not explained. W. D. Hamilton was said to have considered the hypothesis worthy of serious investigation, but it is not clear what the hypothesis is. Hooper's book is cited but almost nothing is said about the theses it contains. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Marco491 (talk • contribs) 00:15, 27 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Indeed. And a link to Hooper's 2004 paper/page would be good. Tuntable (talk) 06:13, 24 November 2022 (UTC)

Alternative and pseudo‑medicine ?
The box on the right states that the article is part of a series in "Alternative and pseudo-medicine". But the theory in question has nothing to do with this. A series of "Conspiracy theories" are also cited in the box, but again, the topic in question has nothing to do with conspiracy theories. The thesis supported by the main proponents of this hypothesis is an accidental contamination of polio vaccines with SIV viruses (see also the discussion "Should this really be called a hypothesis?" on this page). I therefore think that the categorization of this page as "alternative medicine" and as "conspiracy theory" is inappropriate should be changed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Marco491 (talk • contribs) 00:24, 27 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I removed the "Alternative medicine sidebar" side bar because it wasn't relevant to the topic of the article. Some examples of pages linked with "Alternative Medicine", in fact, are: "Acupuncture", "Qigong", "Yoga as therapy", while this article does not present any type of alternative medicine, since it talks about the theory of contamination of polio vaccines with SIV viruses. In the future, a more relevant side bar may be associated.--Marco491 (talk) 00:06, 28 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Actually, the HIV/OPV theory is a conspiracy theory. That a large number of seniour virologists have conspired to suppress it with bogus science.  There is also a large amount of evidence that HIV/OPV is actually true.  However, as the conspiracy has so far been successful, we cannot say that here.  Maybe once the Covid-19 lab leak becomes recognized, HIV/OPV can be revisited. Tuntable (talk) 09:04, 5 July 2023 (UTC)