The Internet has made it possible for every conspiracy theory to flourish. There are three basic versions of the HIV denial credo:

The first arose from (Peter) Duesberg's conviction that HIV does not cause AIDS. He has been shunned by the medical establishment for insisting since the 1980s that HIV has nothing to do with AIDS. Rather, he says HIV isn't a killer virus and that AIDS is best avoided by eating properly and abstaining from drugs.

The second argues that, even if the virus is harmful, the risks of ARV drugs far outweigh the benefits. AIDS drugs are poisons pushed by doctors corrupted by the pharmaceutical industry....

Finally, and most perniciously, there are those who argue that sub-Saharan Africa, where nearly 2/3 of HIV infected people live and as many as 20 million have died, simply has no AIDS epidemic. Instead, they blame the absence of proper nutrition or clean water, factors that certainly exacerbate the effects of AIDS but do not cause it.

On the Internet, where anyone can profess to be an expert, rumor sites can make all these theories seem plausible, particularly to a new generation that has not been educated properly about the risks of AIDS. One site, virusmyth.net has more than a thousand web pages linked to it.