HIV to Covid-19 and Beyond

            Monkeypox, HIV, SARS-CoV-2, Marburg, Ebola, Zika, H5N1. The viral attack against humanity is heating up with novel viruses emerging ever more rapidly. Unfortunately, humans keep failing to learn the lessons science tries to teach. That is why I wrote two books, Understanding Covid-19, How 500,000 American Lives Could Have Been Saved, and Dear Bill Gates, How to End Serial Pandemic Failure, HIV-1 to Covid-19.

            Noble Prize laureate David Baltimore discovered the reverse transcriptase enzyme in 1970 and the NF-kB protein in 1986. Physicians used reverse transcriptase inhibitors against HIV starting with AZT in 1987. They should have added NF-kB inhibitors because they are cheaper and arguably more effective – but they did not. They were too cheap. By failing to add broad-spectrum antiviral NF-BIs against HIV, we also failed to learn how to use them against Covid-19. The continued failure to learn how to utilize all safe and effective methods to treat viral disease is another disaster waiting to happen. That may arrive sooner rather than later.   

            The mineral selenium forms the active part of most antioxidants that are the key to maintaining cellular health. Viruses attack the cellular selenium supply because they need it to form their viral envelop-skin. The loss of selenium causes CD4 immune cell count to fall and eventually the immune system to collapse. This happens with HIV, Ebola and in severe Covid-19. Restoring selenium levels has been shown to often reverse even sepsis blood-poisoning and the multi-organ-failure that occurs at the end of terminal viral disease. If the body loses enough water or oxygen a person dies.  If selenium levels fall 20% below normal a person suffers immune deficiency. If it falls 30% below normal, as with oxygen or water, a person dies.        

            The next pandemic may be H5N1 avian influenza that is currently jumping the species barrier from birds into mammals. This is the same H5N1 combination that caused the deadly 1918 Spanish flu that killed 675,000 Americans. Today that would equate to 2.5 million American lives. In the three hundred people that birds have directly infected with H5N1 in the last twenty years, the mortality rate has been 55%. However once H5N1 mutates to allow human-to-human transmission, theoretically that rate should fall. No one can predict how far.  

            Contagious and infectious viruses continue to emerge from the biome. Meanwhile medical research has been corrupted by the profit motive that places the bottom line above the health of society and the lives of its citizens. For instance after a trial of low-dose 200mcg selenium in combination with ARVs against advanced AIDS in Nigeria in 2006 showed spectacular results, that result was covered-up and no medical journal article was published. In 2014 when I helped show that moderately high-dose 1.2mg selenium could reduce the mortality rate of Ebola in Liberia by 42.8%, that result was ignored by US authorities. [visit winagainstebola.com]

            Unlike protease inhibitors and reverse transcriptase inhibitors that specifically reduce HIV replication, selenium and NF-kBIs are broad-spectrum antivirals that reduce replication of most viruses. Ignoring these cheap, effective, available broad-spectrum antiviral medications is not the way to win the war against continuing viral invasion. Failing to teach the lessons science demonstrates is a recipe for disaster. These broad spectrum antiviral medications should have been used for early therapy for Covid-19. They were not.

            I have studied the interaction of viruses with the cells they infect and with the immune system for over thirty years. My focus has been on how viruses cause disease. My conclusion is that deadly viruses cause disease by attacking the selenium supply. As selenium levels fall, so does CD4 count and immunity. Restoring the selenium supply though supplementation is highly beneficial. Likewise, NF-kappaB inhibitor drugs reduce both inflammation and viral replication. The many NSAID drugs of varying strengths are not just anti-inflammatories, they are also antiviral drugs that inhibit viral replication to a similar extent that they inhibit inflammation. Simply calling these drugs anti-inflammatories and not recognizing they are also antiviral drugs misrepresents their capacity. Hiding this fact fails to alert the public to how they can help protect their health and lives against viral infections such as Covid-19. If physicians and patients had been alerted that both selenium and NSAID drugs could have benefited them if used as early therapy for Covid, it could have prevented innumerable hospitalizations and saved thousands of lives. This scientific knowledge should not be covered up during the coming H5N1 pandemic. H5N1 could be many times more deadly than the Covid pandemic. We will regret it if it is.

Howard Armistead is an independent AIDS, Ebola, and Covid-19 researcher.