advertising campaign with the message 'Don't inject AIDS

In England, the UK Government expanded syringe exchange schemes to prevent transmission of HIV through drug use, and also launched an advertising campaign with the message 'Don't inject AIDS'.³⁴

In the autumn, a book by Randy Shilts called 'And the Band Played On' was published, which chronicled the early years of the AIDS epidemic.³⁵ Shilts' book made an important contribution to documenting the history of AIDS, but his view of "the facts about AIDS", as well as his opinions, differ greatly from others on a number of occasions.³⁶

Shilts was the first to identify a French-Canadian flight attendant called Gaetan Dugas as 'Patient Zero'. Shilts claimed that Gaetan Dugas played a key role in the early spread of AIDS in America, and the story of 'Patient Zero' was widely publicised by the media.³⁷ But there never was a Patient Zero.

Poster "AIDS: 1 IN 61" Gran Fury collection

"There's no Patient Zero. It's lots and lots people moving around from New York to San Francisco, and the rest of the world. If there ever was an original Patient Zero, it would have been back in the mid-Seventies. But there isn't an original Patient Zero."Andrew Moss³⁸

In Africa, President Kaunda of Zambia announced that his son had died of AIDS, and appealed to the international community to treat AIDS as a worldwide problem.³⁹ In Uganda, 16 volunteers who had been personally affected by HIV/AIDS came together to found the community organisation TASO.⁴⁰

In October, AIDS became the first disease ever debated on the floor of the United Nations (UN) General Assembly. The General Assembly resolved to mobilize the entire UN system in the worldwide struggle against AIDS, under the leadership of the WHO.⁴¹

The American scientist Dr. Peter Duesberg published a scientific paper in a cancer journal that questioned the then dominant theory that viruses were involved in cancer causation, and also queried the link between HIV and AIDS.⁴² In November, Channel 4 broadcast the documentary 'AIDS: the Unheard Voices' to its British audience. In the documentary Duesberg and others argued that HIV could not be the cause of AIDS.⁴³

By December, 71,751 cases of AIDS had been reported to the World Health Organisation, with the greatest number reported by the USA (47,022). Countries reporting over 2,000 cases included France (2,523), Uganda (2,369) and Brazil (2,102). Five other countries reported more than 1,000 cases: Tanzania (1,608), Germany (1,486), Canada (1,334), UK (1,170) and Italy (1,104).

The WHO also reported that an estimated 5 to 10 million people were infected with HIV worldwide, with 150,000 cases of AIDS expected to develop in the following 12 months and up to 3 million within the next 5 years