Subject: AIDS Emergency! Call 911!
From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 2 Aug 1996 18:57:42 -0400

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Friday, August 2, 1996

MEDIA CONTACTS:
Michael Bellefountaine: (415) 487-9954
Todd Swindell: (415) 864-8355

Call 911! AIDS Activists Seize Hospital Emergency Room for DNCB Support Group
Meeting.
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Termination of meeting space contract by Davies Medical Center prompts ACT UP
San Francisco takeover; 3 arrested and jailed.

San Francisco - More than two dozen members of the AIDS community, eager to
attend the August 1st monthly meeting of the DNCB Treatment and Support Group
of ACT UP San Francisco, were shocked to be denied entrance to Davies Medical
Center by 20 uniformed San Francisco police officers who barricaded entrances
and lined the streets with numerous squad cars and police vans. Organizers of
the support group, which has utilized Davies' facilities for over four years,
were outraged to discover that while attending the XI International
Conference on AIDS in Vancouver their meeting space contract had been
terminated.

Instead of sharing scientific information from the recent conference, meeting
participants watched as eight enraged activists from the ACT UP affinity
group SPITT (Stop Promoting Immunosuppressive Toxic Treatments) stormed and
seized the hospital's emergency room to use as the meeting site. Protesters
chanted "AIDS is an Emergency! You Won't Shut Us Up!" as police attempted to
gain control of the chaotic eruption. Three protesters, Michael
Bellefountaine, Todd Swindell, and David Pasquarelli were thrown to the
ground, beaten, arrested and jailed. They were cited for trespassing and
released Friday morning.

ACT UP organizers stated that their contract to utilize the Gazebo Room, a
meeting space reserved for HIV-positive community groups and patients, was
abruptly cancelled by Volunteer Services Director Barbara Hauser. Valerie
Roberts, point person from Davies' Executive Office refused to contact ACT UP
SF to discuss the contract termination. Activists charge that this is yet
another example of the abusive treatment  people with AIDS receive from the
mainstream medical community, which they state has been unduly influenced by
funding from the pharmaceutical industry.

"The AIDS establishment has let it be known that when fighting this disease
they will aggressively silence any exchange of information concerning recent
advances in immunology that don't support the use of expensive, toxic drugs,"
stated ACT UP SF dissident Medea Lopez. "They criticize our direct action
disruptions of other forums by saying 'hold your own meetings' then
subsequently deny us the ability to do so. Davies Medical Center is
suppressing AIDS dissent with as much deadly force as their physicians
suppress PWAs' immune systems. This is war!"

AIDS activists stated that the human immune system is made up of two types of
balanced immune responses: cellular immunity, where pathogens like viruses
that infect cells are controlled, and humoral immunity, in which invaders
that lie outside of cells are kept in check by chemicals called antibodies.
Researchers believe that HIV reproduces preferentially in the humoral branch
thereby causing an overactivation of this type of immune response. In turn,
cellular immunity, the body's natural defense against the numerous
opportunistic infections that are the actual causes of death in AIDS, becomes
severely depressed.

Meeting participants came prepared to distribute and discuss recent articles
that encourage the strengthening of cellular immunity and condemn the use of
AZT as the foundation of combination antiviral therapies that destroy this
vital branch of the immune system.

According to a cutting-edge research article by renowned immunologists Mario
Clerici and Gene Shearer entitled "Correlates of protection in HIV infection
and the progression of HIV infection to AIDS" [Immunology Letters 51 (1996)
67-73] "It has been shown that strong HIV-specific [cellular immunity] is
detected in HIV-positive long-term non-progressors and that an [antibody
immune response] is characteristic of HIV-positive patients with progressive
HIV infection, but is not observed in HIV-positive long-term surviving
individuals who do not progress rapidly to AIDS."

ACT UP members are quick to point out that the best indicator of a robust
cellular immune response is an elevated level of cytotoxic T lymphocytes
(CD8s). Numerous studies have demonstrated that dinitrochlorobenzene (DNCB),
an unpatentable, inexpensive, non-toxic contact sensitizer has been shown to
stimulate the cellular immune response and increase the proliferation of
these important protective lymphocytes.

ACT UP San Francisco made global headlines during the recent AIDS conference
by demanding that the focus of AIDS research shift from "killing the virus"
to strengthening one's cellular immunity. Furthermore, in Vancouver ACT UP SF
harshly criticized the use of reverse transcriptase and protease inhibitors
to suppress HIV by citing that research has shown that these drugs damage
one's cellular immune response. During one scientific symposium on the use of
these agents, ACT UP members drenched the presenters with fake blood and
demanded that AZT, the first approved anti-HIV therapy, be pulled from the
market immediately.

"AZT has emerged as the faltering foundation upon which all new
antiretroviral combinations are constructed and against which they are
compared. As such, every subsequent combination approach is piled atop this
veritable house of cards," commented Mike Barr in an article from the current
issue of POZ Magazine. "AZT's days are unquestionably numbered."

The DNCB Treatment Group of ACT UP San Francisco will resume its monthly
support group meetings in September. Please call (415) 954-8896 for time and
location. ACT UP San Francisco can be reached by calling (415) 522-2907.

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AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power * ACT UP San Francisco
1388 Haight Street, #218 * San Francisco, CA 94117
Phone: (415) 522-2907 * Fax: (415) 834-0243 * Email: [email-masked]