Subject: ACT UP SF zaps Senechek!
From: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 30 Jan 1996 04:09:16 -0500

Senechek Makes a KILLING...
...KILLING your CD8s

On Friday, January 26, 1996 seven members of ACT UP San Francisco disrupted a
forum presented by Dr. David Senechek at Metropolitan Community Church in the
Castro. The topic presented was "placing HIV in remission" by using
"aggressive antiviral therapy" (triple combination, protease inhibitors,
etc.) There were apporoximately 200 people in attendance.

The goal of ACT UP SF's disruption was to uncover what effects aggressive
antiviral therapy has on cellular immunity; specifically CD8 cytotoxic T
lymphocytes (CTLs). These important protective cells are found in elevated
levels among long-term nonprogressors of HIV disease and have the ability to
kill HIV and control breakouts of opportunistic infections.

Two HIV-positive members of ACT UP SF were removed from the forum by police
when they refused to allow the presentation to continue until Dr. Senechek
disclosed the effects combination therapy had on CD8s. Senechek refused to
answer the question.

Regarding the heavy police presence at the forum (a total of a dozen
officers) ACT UP SF activist Michael Bellefountaine commented, "It is obvious
by Dr. Senechek's intimidation tactic of employing a cadre of police officers
that he wants to silence us in an effort to avoid answering our questions
about the effect of aggressive chemotherapy on cellular immunity.   We know
that he is hiding the fact that these drugs destroy patients' CD8 cells and
we're not going to shut up until that deadly secret is exposed."

What follows is the text of a flier distributed to those who attended the
Januray 26th forum:

========================================

Aggressive Antiviral Therapy Destroys Cellular Immunity!

David Senechek is in the AIDS business. He makes his living pushing toxic,
expensive, unproven drugs onto a desperate, frightened community. Following
his treatment advice to "place HIV in remission"can be hazardous to your
health and can cause serious damage to your cellular immunity. Here are some
things you should know:

* The human immune system has two parts; cellular immunity (Th1 response) and
humoral immunity (Th2 response). Cellular immunity can destroy HIV and
controls virtually all opportunistic infections that kill people with AIDS.
Humoral immunity is overactivated by HIV's replication, is what forms
antibodies to HIV and is the target of all currently approved anti-HIV drugs.

* Senechek used to tell his patients to take AZT before the drug was exposed
as being ineffective at improving survival time or health in people with HIV
disease.(1, 2) Now the good doctor tells his patients to combine AZT with
new, unproven drugs that work in a manner similar to AZT's mode of action.
Makes perfect sense, right? Yeah, sure.

Senechek refuses to admit that using antivirals to interfere with the
reproduction of HIV in the blood's non-proliferating Th2 CD4 cells also
inhibits the production of protective Th1 CD8 cytotoxic T lymphocytes. Recent
long-term studies of AZT and other antivirals have found that "the inhibitory
effects of antivirals on immune cells may contribute to the immune
deterioration observed in patients following prolonged use of the drugs."(3)
 Hey David, whatever happened to the Hippocratic oath?

* Now that recent studies are questioning combination therapy with
antivirals, Senechek is hyping protease inhibitors as a new improvement to
his arsenal of failed "weapons" against HIV.

Yet, because of the rapid resistance that HIV forms against protease
inhibitors, they must be taken with antivirals like AZT in order to maximize
their effect upon laboratory markers. Recent studies, however, cast serious
doubt over the worth of this new class of drugs by warning that resistance to
one compound often causes an acquired resistance to other biochemically
similar agents.(4) Also, like other antivirals, the actions of protease
inhibitors are not limited to only HIV-infected cells but, rather, affect all
cells in the body. As a result, there is the very real threat that these
agents may damage healthy cells that are important in maintaining immune
competence.

* Senechek tries to dupe HIV-positive patients into believing that the
effects of antiviral drugs on laboratory CD4 counts and peripheral blood
viral load in humans is synonymous with increased survival time and improved
quality of health for PWAs.

The truth is that CD4 counts are dubious indicators of HIV-disease
progression and have been called into question for their "uncritical use as a
surrogate endpoint for assessment of benefit from long-term antiviral
therapy."(1) Peripheral blood viral load counts that are artificially lowered
by the initiation of antiviral therapy have also been widely criticized as
unreliable. For example, an article in the April 1995 issue of Lancet
concerning viral replication stated that "the principle that virus
suppression will produce a major clinical benefit must remain an article of
faith."

* Since the beginning of the AIDS crisis, research has been held hostage by
profiteering pharmaceutical companies and the virologists and clinicians on
their payrolls. Killing or suppressing HIV with toxic chemical agents has
taken precedent over strengthening the immune system to prevent opportunistic
infections and improve our survival time and quality of life. Finally,
however, as so-called "promising drugs" continue to fail, patients and
immunologists are rejecting the toxins, investigating long term survivors of
AIDS and searching out a new paradigm.(5, 6)

Researchers like Anthony Fauci now admit that "the fact that nonprogressors
have high levels of anti-HIV CTLs strongly suggests that CTL responses to HIV
may be important in the control of virus replication over time."(7) Noted
immunologists Gene Shearer and Mario Clerici recommend developing "a strategy
that will maximize cellular immunity and let antibody responses appear as
they will."(8) It's about fucking time!

Senechek claims he practices medicine.
Looks to us like he's perfected murder.

(1) Seligmann M et al. Concorde study. The Lancet, April 1994.
(2) Volberding PA et al. A comparison of immediate with deferred zidovudine
therapy for asymptomatic HIV-infected adults with CD4 cell counts of 500 or
more per cubic millimeter. NEJM, August 17, 1995.
(3) Heagy W, Crumpacker C, Lopez P, Finberg R. Inhibition of Immune Fuctions
by Antiviral Drugs. J. Clin. Invest., Vol. 87, June 1991.
(4) Condra JH et al. In vivo emergence of HIV-1 variants resistant to
multiple protease inhibitors. Nature, April 6, 1995.
(5) Pantaleo G et al.Studies in subjects with long-term nonprogressive human
immunodeficiency virus infection. NEJM, January 26, 1995.
(6) Zinkernagel R. Immunology taught by viruses. Science, Vol. 271, January
12, 1996.
(7) Haynes BF, Pantaleo G, Fauci AS. Toward an understanding of the
correlates of protective immunity to HIV infection. Science, January 19,
1996.
(8) Shearer GM, Clerici M. Protective immunity against HIV infection: has
nature done the experiment for us? Immunology Today, January 1996.

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]