Emerging Viruses-Aids & Ebola - By Leanard ... - preterhuman.net

with little more than personal glory." Gallo's outburst confirmedthe "darkest suspicions about the NCI." [12]Another bizarre tale involved Dr. V. S. Kalyanaraman. Kaly, ashe was called, had been recruited by Dr. Don Francis at the CDCto develop a "top-rate retrovirus lab" in late 1983. Kaly hadgained fame for his HTLV-II discovery while working underGallo."When cajoling did not persuade Kaly to stay in Bethesda, Galloresorted to threats: He would not let his researcher take anyreagents to any retrovirus from his NCI lab to the CDC. He'dhave to culture his own viruses and anti-bodies, Gallo said.Meanwhile, Don Francis heard in early August that Gallo hadasked top officials at the National Cancer Institute to stop theCDC from hiring the younger researcher. . . . [When] Gallo knewthese efforts would not succeed. . . he phoned Don Francisdirectly."Gallo said there was no need for two government agencies toreplicate retrovirus research efforts. When this approach failed,Gallo warned, "There's no way we will collaborate with you." Hesaw "no evidence of CDC goodwill" toward the NCI.Allegedly, for that reason, he withheld experimental reagentsincluding the antibodies needed to identify AIDS-likeviruses.[13]Later, Gallo voiced his concern to colleagues that the CDC wasconspiring to determine the cause of AIDS and then "run withoutme," fearing he would get no credit.At various times, Gallo warned Francis not to work with otherresearchers, especially the French. "Don't form tertiaryrelationships," Francis was told. "Keep me in a prime relationshipwith AIDS and cherish the goodwill." [13]Shilts also reported that Gallo's collaboration with LucMontagnier was altogether shameless. When Montagnier hadallegedly discovered what later turned out to be the AIDS virus,he asked Gallo to supply the antibody needed to examine theretrovirus's dissimilarity to Gallo's HTLV-I. "Oddly," wroteShilts, "his antibody had been almost inactivated when it arrivedfrom Dr. Robert Gallo's lab." Montagnier labored to run theanalysis anyway.But that also seemed odd. The report I had read in 'Nature'revealed that Montagnier already had Gallo's HTLV antibody testkit as early as 1982. [14]Shilts also reported that after writing up the results andsubmitting his paper to Science for publication, Montagnierlearned that Gallo was sent the manuscript as "part of the reviewprocess." Gallo criticized the work and informed Montagnier thatthe acronym he had used to initially name his retrovirus, "RUB,"was offensive. The NCI chief retrovirologist then persuaded theFrench researcher to claim his find was from the HTLV family ofviruses that he had discovered. [15]