And the Band Played On

The story began in Africa 1976, when people started to die of an unknown illness. 1981 Dr. Don Francis becomes aware of the number of deaths among gay men in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York City. 1980 many men came down with a strange illness. 1982 the AIDS virus was discovered to be in the blood supply. October 1982 634 people were reported for having AIDS. 1984 patient zero dies. Dr. Don Francis is an American who worked on the outbreak in Africa in the late 1970s. Dr. Robert Charles Gallo, discovered the first retrovirus. Bill Kraus was an American gay rights and AIDS activist. Gaetan Dugas, French-Canadian, patient zero. Bobbi Cambell was an early United States activist. Became the 16th person to be diagnosed with the virus. Dr. Luc Montagnier, discovered with a group the new virus. Dr. Francoise Barre-Sinoussi a French virologist at the Institut Pasteur in Paris, France. Max Essex, is chair of the Harvard School of Public Health AIDS Initiative. suspected that HIV/AIDS could be a blood transfusion. One of the quotes that caught my attention from the movie Ans the Band Played On was, " This is not a political issue. This is a health issue. This is not a gay issue. This is a human issue." -Rodger Lyon. This particular quote caught my attention because it is true. Many were focusing on the money and that they did not have the enough resources to research this new virus. I believe that saving lives is more important that the money that you are going to receive. AIDS grew bigger due to the battle between Dr. Gallo and the french because at this point they were not focusing on the virus they were just focusing on who get credit for discovering this new virus. Also the research money, they did not want to put the money that the doctors needed in order to research this new virus more into detail. The things that could heve been done differently are the view of the new virus. they should not have focused on who got it first but to get rid of the virus. Also the arguments of who found the virus first or if they had enogh money to go on with the resaerch. This would of prevented a lot of deaths and the spread of the HIV/ADIS virus.