GODFREY Bloom (UKIP MEP for Yorkshire and North Lincolnshire) opines that, after numerous scares which didn't quite turn out as feared, global warming is the latest and he is "going up the pub" (Global warming, letters, April 10).

I suggest he stays at the pub. Whatever readers' views on climate change might be, a flippant denial from an elected representative of the people is hardly appropriate.

And Godfrey, no, we all didn't die from Aids in Europe in the 1980s. There were 22,000 new HIV infections in Western and Central Europe in 2005, to add to the 720,000 already infected, though.

I suppose that 65 million people infected to date, nearly 25 million already dead, and the fact that the vast majority of the more than 35 million people living with HIV are unaware of their status, isn't a problem as it affects mainly Africa.

Hugh Palmer, Lecturer, Faculty of Health and Social Care, University of Hull, Cottingham Road, Hull.