In the movie And the Band Played On, stakeholders’ interests stymied public health efforts to research and implement health policy to control the rapidly emerging disease, acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS). The stakeholders within the movie, those whose interest would be impacted by policy change, included the affected populations, scientists, state and federal public health officials, and organizations including blood banks. Early in the epidemic, the Center for Communicable Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) were tentative in disclosing vital information – many homosexual men were becoming infected in the bathhouses (Pillsbury, Sanford, & Spottiswoode, 1993). Despite having the supporting evidence of patient zero and a sexual cluster …show more content…
The movie, And the Band Played On, portrays a current issue the U.S. health care system face: the effects of societal perceptions of people who should receive health care support. Those perceived as undeserving are disregarded. Homosexual men were the first to be affected by AIDS in the US, and because of this, the stigma of homosexuality prevented developing health care policy to control the epidemic. Homosexuality was, and to a lesser extent now, not widely accepted. Marginalizing gay individuals was seen in the movie at the beginning, when media coverage on AIDs would not include “homosexual” within the news title (Pillsbury, Sanford, & Spottiswoode, 1993). This represents how media has to be marketed; the broader public will not be interested if a new disease only affects an undesirable population. Another example of this negligence is seen when Phillip Burton is asked to introduce a bill on AIDS. He agrees, but does not hesitate to retort, “They couldn’t get a dime out of this administration with the name gay on it” (Pillsbury, Sanford, & Spottiswoode, 1993). Finally, in order to change the perception, at the CDC conference with blood agencies, they renamed gay related immune deficiency (GRID) to AIDS, and the film cuts to news segments finally covering …show more content…
Dr. Donald Francis, in the movie And the Band Played On, was portrayed as an easily angered man whose communication style was ineffective in persuading. An important example was during the CDC and blood agency workshop, with the CDC trying to convince the agencies to spend money to screen for hepatitis B as a proxy for AIDS (Pillsbury, Sanford, & Spottiswoode, 1993). After hearing reasons to why the agencies are hesitant to do this, Dr. Francis begins to angrily yell about cost efficiency required to save lives. In the eyes of these agencies, transfusion complications occur, and AIDS may not even be relevant. Screaming closes the door to discussion, as seen when the blood agencies representatives turn their head and refuse to
Carl Zimmer the guest speaker of this broadcast states that in 1981 doctors described for the first time a new disease, a new syndrome which affected mostly homosexual men. The young men in Los Angeles were dying and the number of cases was growing faster and faster. The number of deaths was increasing from eighty to six hundred and twenty five in just the first few months. After the first few cases in LA, AIDS was declared to be one of the deadliest pandemics the world had ever seen after the plague in the Middle Ages.
One important scene in the film ‘The Age of Aids’ is “Port Au Prince, Haiti”. In this scene it outlines the conditions in Haiti, which were very poor and it turn left the city defenseless against the new disease. In 70’s and 80’s the disease began to be seen by doctors and priests who were being sought after to cure a unseen disease which left the people with the “look of death, [making them] so skinny you could see their bones”. The scene then goes on to take a look at one of the first HIV clinics in Port Au Prince, which was opened in the roughest parts of town. One of the surprising things that this clinic found when they were looking at the patients coming in was that the mean they were analyzing had more contact with women then they had with men. This was extremely interesting because this was completely different from what the pattern of the disease had been in the US. The doctors believed this was because homosexual males had been coming into Haiti as tourists and where having sex with locals, who in comparison didn’t call themselves homosexuals because even though they had been having sex with men, the number of women they were having sex with greatly outnumbered the men. This was extremely important because it allowed people to open their eyes, and realize that this was not a homosexual disease, that anyone could get the disease. And that’s exactly what happened within the Haitian community. Within three years the disease had spread across the entire island effects all aspects of society. This scene was effective because it is able to change a viewer with little knowledge of the disease to understand how doctors were able to come to the conclusion that the disease was not in fact a homosexual ...
...y, it is a disease where friends have to stand by and watch their friends die. The death toll of AIDS could have been reduced, many people believe, if it had been handle correctly. Although, when one thinks about it from Mayor Koch’s seat there was only so much he could have done. Koch never wrote or said anything that was malicious toward the AIDS community. Like many, it seemed he wanted to help but did not know exactly how to do it properly. Every move someone made when it came to AIDS was brutally scrutinized by both sides of the t so many politicians didn’t know what they could possibly do. The nature of this disease and the political ramifications drive home the overarching idea that the sexual is political because without the sexual nature of this plague it would not have been as difficult to deal with politically and millions of lives could have been saved.
The CDC published a Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report on June 5, 1981 describing cases of a rare lung infection, Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia (PCP), accompanied by other unusual infections, in five young, previously healthy, gay men in Los Angeles. By the time the report was published, two of the men had died. This marked the first official reporting of what is now known as the AIDS epidemic. It wasn’t until September 24, 1982, however, when the CDC used the term AIDS (acquired immune deficiency syndrome) for the first time. The San Francisco Chronicle covered the story the very next day; just days later, Doctors around the nation swarmed the CDC with reports of similar cases. It wasn’t until November of 1985, after the epidemic had claimed
Randy Shilts set out to make monumental changes in the world’s perspective of AIDS. He planned to enlighten, motivate, and educate the population on this tragic disease that has already claimed so many lives. He believed that virtually all the misconceptions about AIDS would be corrected and the public would insist that more be done to stop the epidemic. "I had hoped to effect some fundamental changes. I really believed I could alter the performance of the institutions that had allowed AIDS to sweep through America unchecked" (220). Shilts’s immense expectations positioned him for his inevitable sense of failure. He did not accomplished all that he had planned. AIDS was still spreading and people were still dying. "The bitter irony is, my role as an AIDS celebrity just gives me a more elevated promontory from which to watch the world make the same mistakes in the handling of the AIDS epidemic that I hoped my work would help to change"(220).
The Movie “And the Band Played On” is the framework of the earliest years of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS). Also known as the Gay disease. The movie examines HIV/AIDS epidemic in the United States in the earlier 1980’s and emphasizes on three crucial components. An immunologist with knowledge in eradicating smallpox and containing the Ebola virus, joins the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) to attempt and recognize just what this disease is. The film also deals the administration and government side that does not seem to care. The homosexual community in San Francisco is separated on the nature of the disease but also want to know what should be done
Steven Epstein is a sociologist whose expertise lies in health care inequalities and research on human subjects. Published in 1995, Impure Science: AIDS, Activism, and the Politics of Knowledge is a study of the politicized production of knowledge in the AIDS epidemic in the United States. This work shows Epstein’s interest in how expertise is constructed, the ways in which those who are considered “outsiders” can influence medicine, and how credibility is gained and lost. Epstein focuses on the question of how knowledge is produced through complex interactions among government agencies, pharmaceutical companies, scientists, medical people, and “treatment activists” to discover how knowledge about AIDS emerges out of what he calls "credibility struggles."
“And the Band Played On” was an HBO movie that illustrated the AIDS crisis in the 1980s and early 1990s. The movie touched on subjects concerning the reaction of the gay community, the heterosexual community, and the medical community. It showed not only the research in AIDS, but also the way that the US government dealt with it. The movie expressed the consequences the gay community suffered, the plight of the medical community in researching the disease, and the issue of government response to it.
In 1981 the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report first rare cases of what is seemingly pneumonia in young gay men. These cases were then grouped together and the disease known as AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome) takes its root in American Society. This disease spread quickly and the events following are responses to the spread of the disease in America known as the AIDS Crisis, where the response of both the people and the government would impact and change society and American culture and lead to emergence of a gay identity, persecution and fear of those with the disease, marketing of safe sex, and the deterioration of class barriers.
“And the Band Played On” is a movie about the epidemiological discovery of AIDS in 1980’s. In the movie, an epidemiologist named Don Francis and his team travel to Central Africa and discovers a community that has been riddled with death due to an unknown illness later identified as the Ebola Fever. Years later, with the effects of the devastating epidemic that he witnessed in Africa still plaguing him, he became aware of the augmented frequency of death among gay men in areas of Los Angeles, New York, and San Francisco from a mysterious illness with symptoms such as pneumocystis, and Kaposi’s sarcoma, and decided to investigate it. Thus, his examination of the outbreak ultimately led to the discovery of AIDS. During his discovery, he is met
The movie, And the Band Played On, directed by Roger Spotswood demonstrates how the AIDS epidemic spread rapidly across the world. An epidemiologist, Don Francis learns about a very rare epidemic outbreak among gay men known as AIDS. A disease that bought 4,123 cases and was given little importance caused 2,917 deaths. Dr. Francis joins the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) to find the cause of the disease and afterward a cure. Working with less money and old equipment Dr. Francis also has to deal with politicians and the gay community. Furthermore, he has to reason with the CDC who thinks the disease is transmitted through blood. Throughout the movie, Dr. Francis faces many controversies and rivalries among CDC, FDA, blood bank, and the government who doesn’t seem to care about this epidemic.
In the movie “And the Band Played On”, illustrated the origin of the AIDS virus, how it was spread across the world quickly. It began with a scene in 1976, Central Africa, shows how the Ebola disease affected a village and was contained before it was spread. This was to show the beginning of another serious disease called AIDS. The world was not prepared to handle such a contagious plague. Doctors treating people with this virus thought that the first cases of the HIV virus was just an abnormality disease. The disease started to spread all over, especially gay men. Throughout the movie, I was able to see different points, such as the beginning of AIDS, the misconceptions it had, and the anguish it brought to the doctors as well as people around the world.
How to Survive a Plague (2012) is a documentary about the story of two coalitions, ACT-UP and TAG (Treatment Action Group). Both groups dedicate their time and energy to stop AIDS from being the deadly disease that it has been for years and is only getting worse. Those affected by the disease were primarily of the LGBT community. Those with AIDS struggled to see progress with research for a cure because of those who held leadership roles had in certain religious views along with a lack of political interest. As millions of individuals were dying from this abhorrent disease, the two coalitions continued to protest and advocate for change. Through their actions, an effective treatment was found for AIDS. Their actions even led to the LGBT community
As the AIDS epidemic in the United States advanced into the 1990s, it became clear that AIDS had a new target population. AIDS was no longer strictly a gay disease but was leaking into the general heterosexual population as well. Moreover, as the decade progressed, new cases of HIV infection were being increasingly identified in poor, minority communities. While the focus of the AIDS epidemic shifted from the high-profile male homosexual population to poor, minority communities, political activism and financial support for the fight against AIDS also began to decline. With the new limitations set by decreased public support and decreased financial resources, policy-makers, humanitarian organizations, and AIDS activists began to analyze how best to extend AIDS-related resources to these new target populations.
Lupton, D. (1994) Moral Threats and Dangerous Desires: AIDS in the News Media. New York: Taylor & Francis Ltd.