“Aids is Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome. I don't believe it's a sensible thing to ask: 'Does a virus cause a syndrome?' It can't. A virus will cause a disease. The syndrome is a group of diseases as a result of immune deficiency. As a result of immune deficiency you suffer various diseases.”

—  Thabo Mbeki

Source: August 2000, addressing South African Parliament http://www.mg.co.za/articledirect.aspx?articleid=173678&area=%2farchives%2farchives__online_edition%2f http://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/jun/12/aids.chrismcgreal.

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South African politician, President of South Africa 1942

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