The Evolution of the “No-Virus” Theory
The Evolution of the “No-Virus” Theory Julie Beal The no-virus theory was proposed by Stefan Lanka in the late 1990s, riding hot on the heels of his new-found fame as an AIDS dissident. Lanka, a marine biologist, first became interested in the HIV controversy after an Austrian professor called Fritz Pohl told him, “ the official version of HIV and AIDS did not ‘add up.'” After doing some independent research, Lanka decided it would be a good idea to deny the existence of all viruses, rather than just HIV. “ It became clear to me,” he said, “that if I only criticised the postulate of a single virus and did not mention the rest, I was reinforcing the virus theory. And if I did not challenge the conceptual framework from which that theory springs, I was reinforcing it. (Translated from German, this quote is taken from an interview with Lanka in 2021.) In a 1998 interview with Zenger’s magazine , Lanka explained that he had a series of realisations which led him to conclude the arg