Bloodbath in Vancouver!
PRESS RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1996
Bloodbath in Vancouver! Activists Asked To Leave Canada After Crashing AIDS Conference Combo Therapy Promo
ACT
UP SF members drench panel members Paul Volberding and Margaret Fischl
with fake blood to protest promotion of combination antiviral therapies
that destroy the immune system
Vancouver, B.C. -- Yesterday,
nearly ten years after the approval of the first AIDS treatment, AZT,
members of the controversial militant AIDS activist group ACT UP San
Francisco crashed a panel discussion about the drug's use in
combination with other antiviral agents held during the 11th
International Conference on AIDS. AIDS activists renounced the "drugs
into bodies" credo and demanded that Glaxo-Wellcome, AZT's
manufacturer, immediately cease production of the compound and that
AIDS researchers shift the focus of anti-HIV treatment from "killing
the virus" to strengthening the immune system.
Chanting "Margaret Fischl: You're A Fraud! You Gave AZT The Nod!" and
"Volberding: Your Lies Kill! AZT's A Toxic Pill!" twenty irate
activists from ACT UP SF stormed into the pharmaceutical industry panel
discussion "Guidelines for Antiretroviral Therapy: Bringing The
State-Of-The-Art To Clinical Practice." The presentation announced
recommendations for the administration of combination antiviral therapy
as outlined in the July 10th JAMA article "Antiretroviral Therapy For
HIV Infection in 1996: Recommendations of an International Panel."
Over 2,000 stunned conference attendees, packed into two grand
ballrooms, looked on in silence as ACT UP members threw red dollar
bills labeled "Glaxo Blood Money", unfurled a banner and soaked dazed
and speechless panelists with liters of fake blood. AIDS activists
charged panel members Margaret Fischl and Paul Volberding with murder
for instituting and maintaining a scientifically flawed, yet highly
profitable, AIDS treatment approach that urges people with HIV
infection to combat the disease with potent regimens of immune
suppressive agents.
Kicking over chairs,
throwing microphones, smashing glasses and overturning conference
tables, protesters demanded an immediate end to the practice of
treating AIDS patients with dangerous chemotherapeutic agents. The
activists asserted that the therapies hyped during the week-long
conference such as AZT, ddI, ddC and protease inhibitors impair the
immune system's natural ability to fight HIV and control the
opportunistic infections that kill people with AIDS. The symposium was
delayed over an hour as panel members frantically attempted to clean up
their mess.
Two ACT UP SF demonstrators,
David Pasquarelli and Medea Lopez, were arrested and jailed for assault
and criminal mischief. The charges were later dropped and Canadian
immigration officials demanded that the AIDS activists leave the
country by Friday, July 12 at 12:00 a.m.
ACT UP presented evidence that both Fischl and Volberding have accepted
pharmaceutical industry pay-offs to conduct experiments testing AZT and
other antivirals in humans. In fact, it was on the basis of information
from Fischl's 1987 drug trial that AZT was approved; a trial that was
years later exposed as unreliable and poorly conducted and whose data
was branded as fraudulent by prominent AIDS researchers and
statisticians.
The demonstrators harshly
criticized both the panel discussion and journal article announced at
the presentation as nothing more than an advertisement campaign
masquerading as science. The discussion was underwritten by an alliance
of drug companies including Glaxo-Wellcome, Bristol-Meyers Squibb,
Hoffmann-La Roche, Roxanne Laboratories, Chiron Corporation, Agouron,
Merck, and Abbott Laboratories.
"This
entire AIDS conference was bought and paid for by the pharmaceutical
industry as a way to hype their deadly drugs," commented AIDS dissident
Todd Swindell. "These companies concoct expensive products; fund and
execute tests of them on humans to generate fraudulent data supporting
their supposed efficacy; and buy off mainstream AIDS organizations and
conferences to then push these unproven compounds down the throats of
people with AIDS. The entire AIDS treatment approach is murderously
misdirected and must change now!"
ACT UP San Francisco demanded that:
#
1) Glaxo-Wellcome immediately stop the production of AZT since the
agent was approved on the basis of a faulty clinical trial that yielded
fraudulent data.
# 2) The U.S. Government halt all clinical trials that utilize AZT as part of the treatment protocol .
#
3) The U.S. Government initiate a class action lawsuit against Glaxo to
compensate the families of those persons with AIDS whose lives were
destroyed by the drug.
# 4) AIDS
researchers sever all financial ties with pharmaceutical companies;
including stock options, grants, consultation fees, honoria and
reimbursement fees for travel expenses.
#
5) AIDS researchers replace the current "kill the virus with toxic
drugs" treatment paradigm with an immune-based therapeutic strategy
that focuses on improving overall health and strengthening the cellular
immune response that is deficient in AIDS.
ACT
UP members stated that their demonstration in Vancouver was only the
beginning. They vowed to escalate their direct action tactics to end
conflict of interest in AIDS research and confront the promotion of
dangerous chemotherapeutic agents as a method of treating an immune
deficiency syndrome.
MEDIA CONTACTS: Michael
Bellefountaine in Vancouver: (604) 240-4967 Todd Swindell in Vancouver:
(604) 240-4152 ACT UP SF Vancouver Hotline: (604) 980-4547 ext. 324 ACT
UP SF San Francisco Hotline: (415) 522-2907
Press photos and
video footage of the "Vancouver Bloodbath" are available upon request.
For more information on this or other ACT UP SF actions contact us at
(415) 522-2907. Our mailing address is 1388 Haight Street, #218, San
Francisco, CA 94117. Fax: (415) 834-0243; Email:
actupsf@aol.com.
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