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âFollow the science,â weâve been told throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. But if we had paid attention to history, we would have known that once a disease becomes newsworthy, science gets distorted by researchers, journalists, activists and politicians eager for attention and powerâand determined to silence those who challenge their fear-mongering.
When AIDS spread among gay men and intravenous drug users four decades ago, it became conventional wisdom that the plague would soon devastate the rest of the American population. In 1987, Oprah Winfrey opened her show by announcing, âResearch studies now project that 1 in 5âlisten to me, hard to believeâ1 in 5 heterosexuals could be dead of AIDS in the next three years.â The prediction was outlandishly wrong, but she wasnât wrong in attributing the scare to scientists.
One early alarmist was Anthony Fauci, who made national news in 1983 with an editorial in the Journal of the American Medical Association warning that AIDS could infect even children because of âthe possibility that routine close contact, as within a family household, can spread the disease.â After criticism that he had inspired a wave of hysterical homophobia, Dr. Fauci (who in 1984 began his current job, as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases), promptly pivoted 180 degrees, declaring less than two months after his piece appeared that it was âabsolutely preposterousâ to suggest AIDS could be spread by normal social contact. But other supposed experts went on warning erroneously that AIDS could spread widely via toilet seats, mosquito bites and kissing.
Robert Redfield, an Army physician who would later direct the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention during the Covid pandemic, claimed in 1985 that his research on soldiers showed AIDS would soon spread as rapidly among heterosexuals as among homosexuals. He and other scientists became much-quoted authorities for the imminent âheterosexual breakout,â which was proclaimed on the covers of Life in 1985 (âNow No One Is Safe from AIDSâ) and the Atlantic in 1987 (âHeterosexuals and AIDS: The Second Stage of the Epidemicâ).
In reality, researchers discovered early on that transmission through vaginal intercourse was rare, and that those who claimed to have been infected that way were typically concealing intravenous drug use or homosexual activity. One major study estimated the risk of contracting AIDS during intercourse with someone outside the known risk groups was 1 in 5 million. But the CDC nonetheless started a publicity campaign warning that everyone was in danger. It mailed brochures to more than 100 million households and aired dozens of public-service announcements, like a television ad with a man proclaiming, âIf I can get AIDS, anyone can.â
The CDCâs own epidemiologists objected to this message, arguing that resources should be focused on those at risk, as the Journal reported in 1996. But they were overruled by superiors who decided, on the advice of marketing consultants, that presenting AIDS as a universal threat was the best way to win attention and funding. By those measures, the campaign succeeded. Polls showed that Americans became terrified of being infected, and funding for AIDS prevention surgedâmuch of it squandered on measures to protect heterosexuals................................................................
When AIDS spread among gay men and intravenous drug users four decades ago, it became conventional wisdom that the plague would soon devastate the rest of the American population. In 1987, Oprah Winfrey opened her show by announcing, âResearch studies now project that 1 in 5âlisten to me, hard to believeâ1 in 5 heterosexuals could be dead of AIDS in the next three years.â The prediction was outlandishly wrong, but she wasnât wrong in attributing the scare to scientists.
One early alarmist was Anthony Fauci, who made national news in 1983 with an editorial in the Journal of the American Medical Association warning that AIDS could infect even children because of âthe possibility that routine close contact, as within a family household, can spread the disease.â After criticism that he had inspired a wave of hysterical homophobia, Dr. Fauci (who in 1984 began his current job, as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases), promptly pivoted 180 degrees, declaring less than two months after his piece appeared that it was âabsolutely preposterousâ to suggest AIDS could be spread by normal social contact. But other supposed experts went on warning erroneously that AIDS could spread widely via toilet seats, mosquito bites and kissing.
Robert Redfield, an Army physician who would later direct the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention during the Covid pandemic, claimed in 1985 that his research on soldiers showed AIDS would soon spread as rapidly among heterosexuals as among homosexuals. He and other scientists became much-quoted authorities for the imminent âheterosexual breakout,â which was proclaimed on the covers of Life in 1985 (âNow No One Is Safe from AIDSâ) and the Atlantic in 1987 (âHeterosexuals and AIDS: The Second Stage of the Epidemicâ).
In reality, researchers discovered early on that transmission through vaginal intercourse was rare, and that those who claimed to have been infected that way were typically concealing intravenous drug use or homosexual activity. One major study estimated the risk of contracting AIDS during intercourse with someone outside the known risk groups was 1 in 5 million. But the CDC nonetheless started a publicity campaign warning that everyone was in danger. It mailed brochures to more than 100 million households and aired dozens of public-service announcements, like a television ad with a man proclaiming, âIf I can get AIDS, anyone can.â
The CDCâs own epidemiologists objected to this message, arguing that resources should be focused on those at risk, as the Journal reported in 1996. But they were overruled by superiors who decided, on the advice of marketing consultants, that presenting AIDS as a universal threat was the best way to win attention and funding. By those measures, the campaign succeeded. Polls showed that Americans became terrified of being infected, and funding for AIDS prevention surgedâmuch of it squandered on measures to protect heterosexuals................................................................
Opinion | Unlearned AIDS Lessons for Covid
In the 1980s, Fauci and Redfield sowed fear about a heterosexual epidemic that never happened.
www.wsj.com