This is the 2nd such story I've seen in two weeks (the other being about a two-drug cocktail that seemed to cure or at least prevent [the article was unclear] AIDS). With luck, one or both will be true and that disease will be over, lots of suffering and death will end, and the hedonism and anti-puritanism of the mid 1970s can come back and chase out all the fundys.
This article was talked about on Slashdot, and there was some pretty wide skepticism unfortunately.
There was two points of scepticism. Firstly, the basic feel was that no compound really shows promise unless its proven non-toxic in the body, yet also effective at fighting AIDS. An analogy was used that bleach kills the HIV virus pretty darn effectively too... it kills everything around it as well, so it's kind of useless in helping AIDS.
Secondly, many felt skepticism of "science by press release". Being a BYU experiment, the notorious "cold fusion" from the University of Utah was mentioned a couple times. As well, there was some skepticism that a particular company (Ceregenix) was pimping themselves. The BYU name for the compound class, CSAs (Cationic Steroid Antibiotics) was discarded in favor of the company-named "ceragenins", which the science folks on Slashdot really didn't like.
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Date: Feb. 12th, 2006 10:18 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: Feb. 12th, 2006 11:19 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: Feb. 15th, 2006 08:24 pm (UTC)From:There was two points of scepticism. Firstly, the basic feel was that no compound really shows promise unless its proven non-toxic in the body, yet also effective at fighting AIDS. An analogy was used that bleach kills the HIV virus pretty darn effectively too... it kills everything around it as well, so it's kind of useless in helping AIDS.
Secondly, many felt skepticism of "science by press release". Being a BYU experiment, the notorious "cold fusion" from the University of Utah was mentioned a couple times. As well, there was some skepticism that a particular company (Ceregenix) was pimping themselves. The BYU name for the compound class, CSAs (Cationic Steroid Antibiotics) was discarded in favor of the company-named "ceragenins", which the science folks on Slashdot really didn't like.
*shrug* What do I know though. We'll see.