Nancy Reagan refused to help Rock Hudson get pioneering AIDS treatment

Nancy Reagan refused to help dying Hollywood star Rock Hudson get a bed at a French hospital at the forefront of experimental treatment for AIDS, it has been claimed. Then First Lady Mrs Reagan turned down a request from Hudson's publicist for help getting the actor transferred to a French military hospital where he could be seen by Dr Dominique Dormant.

Dr Dormant, who had treated Hudson for AIDS months earlier, was at the time working on an early experimental drug that promised to help bolster the immune systems of AIDS sufferers. Hudson, who had kept secret his homosexuality and his AIDS, was eventually given a bed at the Percy Military Hospital in Clamart - thanks to strings pulled with French officials. But in the end it transpired that his condition had deteriorated so badly that even Dr Dormant's experimental HPA-23 treatments could not help him. He chose to return to Los Angeles and died just two months later, in October 1985.

More at Daily Mail Online

More Than 100 AIDS Researchers and Advocates Perished on Downed Malaysian Jetliner

More than 100 AIDS experts and public health officials on their way to the International AIDS Conference in Australia were among those killed when a Malaysian jetliner was shot down over the Ukraine yesterday. Their deaths prompted an outpouring of grief from their colleagues.

“The International AIDS Society today expresses its sincere sadness at receiving news that a number of colleagues and friends en route to attend the 20th International AIDS Conference taking place in Melbourne, Australia, were on board the Malaysia Airlines MH17 flight that has crashed over Ukraine earlier today,” the group's organizers said.

Among the passengers was Glenn Thomas, a spokesman for the World Health Organization, and Joep Lange, an eminent HIV researcher from the Netherlands who was also the former president of the International AIDS society. Lange led a campaign to expand affordable care for HIV patients in impoverished regions. He is considered an icon in the AIDS medical community. “Joep was a giant in this field; a researcher who really ‘got it’ in terms of human rights, equity and justice. He was as much activist as researcher — and that is rare. Incredibly sad,” Mitchell Warren, an AIDS activist, told NBC News.

The exact number of individuals on flight MH17 who were heading to the conference is unknown, but Australian officials have said it's a “substantial number” including medical doctors, scientists and AIDS advocates. The event is set to host  about 14,000 delegates from around the world.

More @ Alternet

Egypt's military leaders unveil devices they claim can detect and cure Aids

Egypt's military leaders have come under ridicule after the chief army engineer unveiled what he described as a "miraculous" set of devices that detect and cure Aids, hepatitis and other viruses.

The claim, dismissed by experts and called "shocking to scientists" by the president's science adviser, strikes a blow to the army's carefully managed image as the saviour of the nation. It also comes as General Abdel Fatah el-Sisi, who toppled Mohammed Morsi in July after the Islamist leader ignored mass protests calling for him to step down, is expected to announce he will run for president.

The televised presentation – which was made to Sisi, the interim president Adly Mansour and other senior officials – raised concerns that the military's offer of seemingly inconceivable future devices will draw Egypt back into the broken promises of authoritarian rule, when Hosni Mubarak frequently announced grand initiatives that failed to meet expectations.

The Guardian

Scientific Scandal: Miracle Cure for HIV and Hepatitis C by Egypt Army a Hoax (International Business Times)

The Greatest Medical Fraud in History

The Pain, Profit and Politics of AIDS

Zimbabwe's latest way to stop HIV: Force women to have fewer baths and shave off their hair to make them less attractive

A Zimbabwean politician has said women should be forced to bathe less and shave off their hair to make them less attractive to men and help curb the spread of HIV.

Senator Morgan Femai reportedly told a conference he believed the killer disease had spread because men found it difficult to resist attractive and well-dressed women.

The politician added that new laws should be drawn up compelling women to make themselves less attractive to save men from themselves, according to a report on the New Zimbabwe website.

Mail Online