* * *
“My name is Dr. Harry Barrow – B-A-R-R-O-W. I am a molecular biologist, and in 1989, I was the scientific editor of the journal called Bio/Technology.”
“Dr. Barrow, one of the main AIDS researchers, a Dr. Jay Levy at the University of California, San Francisco, said in a Newsday article, and I quote, ‘I think AZT can only hasten the demise of the individual. AIDS is an immune disease and AZT only further harms an already decimated immune system,’ unquote. Do you agree?”
“Absolutely. I can't see how this drug can do anything other than make people very sick. AZT kills T-4 cells – white blood cells vital to the immune system. It does that by seeking out any cell that is engaged in DNA replication and killing it. And the place where most of the cell replication is going on is in the bone marrow – where the white blood cells of the immune system are created. In short, AZT will destroy anyone's immune system, even the healthiest of athletes, within 4 years – two to three years on average. And if a person is already sick, it’ll be more like a year, year-and-a-half tops. And if they don't have AIDS when they start taking AZT, they'll die of AIDS very quickly as AZT kills their T cells.”
“Dr. Barrow, do you know how many people died in 1987, the first year that AZT was being given to AIDS patients?”
“No, I don’t.”
Messick holds up a paper from the lectern and reads, “4,135. How about 1988?”
“Don’t know that either.”
Still reading from the same paper, Messick announces, “4,855. Not that many more than 1987, but now we have people who have been taking AZT for over a year. And do you know how many deaths there were in 1989, two years after AZT was prescribed as the treatment for AIDS?”
Barrow shakes his head.
“14,544 – almost three times the number in ’87 and ’88.” Messick puts down the paper and looks at Dr. Barrow. “Did no one put this together, Dr. Barrow? Was no one able to see the correlation between the introduction of AZT and the incredible rise in AIDS deaths two years later?”
“Not the right people, obviously.”
Messick just stands at the lectern, shaking his head in amazement. “And why, Dr. Barrow, would the government announce on August 17, 1989, that people who were HIV-positive should start taking AZT, even if they had no symptoms of any disease?”
“I have no idea. In all my years in science, I had never seen anything so atrocious. The so-called studies that announcement was based on were so badly done! If AIDS were not such a popular political cause – a money-making and career-making machine – these people could not have gotten away with that.”
“Do you know of anyone, anywhere who has survived taking AZT for any extended period?”
“The longest surviving AZT recipient I know of – taking full-strength AZT as their only therapy – died in three and one-half years. On the other hand, there are thousands of people who have survived with HIV for over 20 years now, as long as they didn't take AZT.”
“We're going to talk to some of them shortly. Thank you, Dr. Barrow.”
Wrongful Death: The AIDS Trial Page 35
