X-Message-Number: 8860 Date: Thu, 27 Nov 1997 10:48:30 -0500 (EST) From: Charles Platt <> Subject: AIDS patient describes Virodene experience Here's the text from the South African newspaper. _______________________________________________________________________ Welcome to The Sunday Independent online. Each week The Sunday Independent brings you local and global news, entertainment and information. ___________________________________________________________ 23 November 1997 Police called in as banned drug poisons Aids patients Medicines Control Council calls for criminal charges against researchers and doctors who peddle Virodene The Medicines Control Council has asked police to investigate criminal charges against researchers and doctors who have been illegally administering the banned drug Virodene to Aids patients. Shocking reports emerged this week of patients reacting adversely to the treatment. This weekend an Aids patient, who has been given a few months to live, spoke of his deep anger after suffering debilitating side-effects from Virodene, which he obtained illicitly from a doctor in Pretoria about three weeks ago. "I feel completely betrayed," he told The Sunday Independent yesterday. He said he was referred to the doctor after meeting one of the Virodene researchers, Olga Visser, at her home in Pretoria a month ago. Despite being warned against taking the drug by his own doctor, he bought a Virodene plaster patch from the doctor for R200, which he administered to himself three weeks ago. Within 10 hours, his throat started to swell, he suffered shortness of breath, diarrhoea and an extreme burning sensation. "The side-effects are not what she said they would be and there has been no change to my condition. I think she should be charged," he said. "She knows that people are desperate and she is abusing this." Virodene was banned by the Medicines Control Council (MCC) in February after tests revealed that the main component of the drug was dimethylformamide, a highly toxic industrial solvent and human poison. The chairman of the MCC, Professor Peter Folb, said it had received reliable reports of widespread administration of Virodene to patients with HIV and Aids, most of whom had severe toxic reactions. Visser and researchers Professor Dirk du Plessis and Dr Callie Landauer presented their findings on Virodene to the cabinet in January, claiming the drug was cheaper and better than any other anti-Aids drug on the market. Virodene was touted as a cheap and effective cure and the researchers asked for government funding to continue their research. When the news became public, there was an outcry from the medical fraternity. Folb told The Sunday Independent yesterday that the MCC had unanimously rejected three separate requests from the Pretoria University researchers to conduct human trials of the drug. "We were given no reasonable information that this drug would benefit patients with HIV and Aids," said Folb. "Disregard of an MCC decision is a criminal offence." Tests carried out on the drug revealed its quality to be "seriously" deficient. "We concluded that the researchers had little insight into what they were doing." Folb confirmed that the MCC was completing an affidavit to be submitted to the police that recommends criminal charges be investigated against all those concerned. "If it is found that any professional people such as doctors or pharmacists are involved, then the matter would be handed over to their respective councils for action. The action of the people concerned is irresponsible, unethical and very misleading to patients," said Folb. The patient told The Sunday Independent that he was infected with the HIV virus 11 years ago, at the age of 19. He developed fullblown Aids in June this year and his sister started to make inquiries about Virodene soon after. The patient met Visser at her house in Pretoria, accompanied by his brother and sister, and asked her about the drug. "I asked to meet other patients, but she refused and said if I decided to take the drug it was at my own risk. She said the drug was being tested successfully in France and she accused other doctors of making quick money by prescribing more expensive drugs". The patient claims he was directed to the doctor by Visser and was told not to ask for Virodene, but to say he wanted plasters. A spokesman for health minister Nkosazana Zuma, Vincent Hlongwane, said she welcomed any research into Aids, but insisted that medical procedure must be followed. "The minister's attitude is that if the law has been broken, then the law must take its course," he said. Acting on a complaint from the Aids Law Project (ALP), the MCC conducted an authorised inspection on Visser's home on Thursday in terms of the Medicines and Related Substances act. Folb said information obtained in the inspection was used in preparing the affidavit for police. He added that if any patients were to be maimed, made seriously ill, or to die as a result of the toxic effects of Virodene, or because they had been misled by the health professionals, all persons concerned were likely to be held responsible and criminally negligent. The ALP's probe revealed the principal researcher was directly connected to the doctor who is dispensing Virodene. An ALP lawyer, Fatima Hassan, said people living with Aids should be protected from abuse and exploitation. The ALP said Zuma should investigate suggestions by Visser that Virodene could be coming from other African countries. Network Radio News on Friday reported that Cryopreservation Technologies, the firm with the patent right to make Virodene, intends taking legal action against the MCC. Spokesman Zigi Visser said the MCC was trying to "bury" Virodene before the Medicines Control Amendment Bill was passed. By Prakash Naidoo 23 November 1997 Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=8860