Smithsonian Exhibits Mark 30th Anniversary of AIDS

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: I’m Shirley Griffith.

STEVE EMBER: And I’m Steve Ember with EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English. Today we visit three current exhibits in Washington D.C. Two of the exhibits are in the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History. Both shows mark the thirtieth anniversary of the first official report about the disease AIDS. A third exhibit, at the Textile Museum, explores the importance and meaning of the color green.

(MUSIC)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: The United Nations estimates that more then sixty million people have been infected with AIDS in the past thirty years. The disease has killed at least twenty five million. Last week, leaders and UN officials met for an AIDS conference in New York City. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged all countries to unite to provide HIV prevention, treatment and care to all people by twenty fifteen. HIV is short for the Human Immunodeficiency Virus – the cause of AIDS.

Today, it is common for members of the medical community, the media and aid organizations to talk about HIV and AIDS. But this was not always the case.

STEVE EMBER: Visitors to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History can see two exhibits dealing with the early years of the AIDS crisis. One exhibit shows how the disease gained recognition as it spread during the early nineteen eighties. The exhibit tells how the disease was misunderstood and misrepresented. It also tells how people slowly came to understand its causes and treatment choices.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: This exhibit is part of an area of the museum called “Science in American Life.” It explores the early spread of HIV and AIDS, starting in nineteen eighty-one. It was in June of that year that America’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention first reported several cases of healthy young men dying in an unusual way. They were dying of diseases usually seen in older adults or people with weak natural defenses for fighting disease.

The men had several things in common. They were homosexual and lived in Los Angeles and New York City. Similar cases were also reported in people with the blood disease hemophilia and people who take drug injections. The CDC did not yet have a name for this disease.

STEVE EMBER: It was not until two years later that scientists identified HIV as the cause of the disease. HIV weakens the body’s natural defenses for fighting disease. A weakened immune system enables pneumonia and cancer to spread. AIDS is short for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome.

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