Subject: Responding to HIV/AIDS, The Pandemic of Our Time, 10/17

Description:
Public Health Grand Rounds Lecture

Responding to HIV/AIDS, The Pandemic of Our Time
with Victoria A. Harden, Ph.D,
founding director and special volunteer, Office of NIH History and the
Stetten Museum at the National Institutes of Health

Friday, October 17, 1:30 p.m.
School of Public Health lecture hall, room 1312
Reception to follow at 2:30 p.m. in Friedgen Family Student Lounge

Join us for a Public Health Grand Rounds lecture, Responding to HIV/AIDS, The
Pandemic of Our Time, with Dr. Victoria Harden, award-winning medical
historian, who will speak about the history of HIV/AIDS and the ongoing
global response to the epidemic more than 30 years after its emergence.

In 1981, HIV/AIDS appeared in a medical world largely focused on chronic
disease problems. With reduced resources, U.S. public health officials at
local, state, and national levels led the effort to define this new disease;
to create guidelines for minimizing transmission, protecting medical
personnel working with patients, and, especially, for protecting the national
blood supply; and to develop policies to minimize scapegoating and mitigate
fear in the public.  Medical researchers rapidly identified the causative
virus and developed a diagnostic test, but treatments were largely
ineffective until 1996, when a “drug cocktail” was developed that
transformed AIDS into a chronic disease for those with access to therapy.
Since that time, AIDS has become an ever larger international public health
challenge, requiring political savvy, fundraising skills, community
organizing, and public education efforts.

Contact Person: Blakely Pomietto
Contact Email: [log in to unmask]