AIDS: A “QUACK” SHOOTS BACK

MEDICINE Mixing essential fatty acid capsules with a nutritional powder, RICHARD STOKLEY created True Health, a product he says can help AIDS sufferers, “We know what we’re doing,” Stokley says. “We know how to go wipe that virus out.” Dr. TERRY PULSE, a Grand Prairie physician, reported astounding results from a study of 29 AIDS patients treated with large doses of True Health, aloe vera juice, and additional fatty acids over a 180-day period in 1988. Pulse maintains that to date, all patients who cooperated in the study, including those who were in the more advanced stages of AIDS, are alive and well. “Seven [patients] are sero-negative,” Pulse adds, claiming that they no longer test positive for AIDS.

Brad Stone, a Food and Drug Administration spokesman, says he is not aware of the specifics of the study, though the FDA has been evaluating the claims about True Health for more than a year. And Kenneth Davis, chief investigator for the Texas Department of Health’s division of food and drugs, seemed more interested in Pulse than in the healing properties of True Health. “Is that quack doctor still working for them?” he asked.

Pulse shoots back at the critics, citing the enthusiastic reception of the True Health results at the Second Annual AIDS Symposium held in San Francisco this past June.

“There are those who think nutrition is quackery,” Pulse says. “Then why do I have some of the best survival statistics? Texas is fourth in the number of AIDS cases and 49th in funding. That’s the real scam.”