logo
episode-header-image
Nov 2021
10m 3s

The Aids 'patient zero' myth

Bbc World Service
About this episode

In the early days of Aids, a misunderstanding made one man the face of the epidemic. Canadian air steward Gaetan Dugas developed the symptoms of HIV/Aids in the early 1980s, but a misreading of scientific data led to him being identified as 'patient zero', giving the mistaken impression he was responsible for the spread of the disease. Lucy Burns speaks to researcher William Darrow, who worked on the epidemic, and to Gaetan Dugas' friend Rand Gaynor.

Photo: Gaetan Dugas. (Credit: Rand Gaynor)

Up next
Yesterday
Ni Una Menos women’s movement in Argentina
On 3 June 2015, tens of thousands of people gathered in the capital, Buenos Aires, and in dozens of cities and towns demanding an end to violence against women. There were demonstrations in Chile and Uruguay in solidarity too. Argentina was reporting a female murder rate of one e ... Show More
9m 31s
Jul 9
Argentina’s national genetics bank created to identify stolen babies
In 1982, Argentine geneticist Victor Penchaszadeh was living in exile in New York when he received a call that would change the course of his career. Two founding members of the campaign group, the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo, were asking for his help to find their kidnappe ... Show More
10m 41s
Jul 8
The mystery of Evita’s corpse
When Eva Peron, Argentina's most famous First Lady, died in 1952, her body was embalmed. Three years later, her widower, Juan Peron, was deposed in a coup. But military officers feared her corpse would become a rallying point of protest against the new government. So they stole i ... Show More
10m 34s
Recommended Episodes
Dec 2021
Four decades of HIV/Aids
It’s forty years since the first report on HIV/Aids appeared in a medical journal. Back in the early days in the 1980s a misunderstanding made one man the face of the epidemic. A Canadian air steward, Gaetan Dugas was mistakenly identified as ‘Patient Zero’. A misreading of scien ... Show More
49m 45s
Dec 2023
AIDS Epidemic: Life & Death On The Frontline
How do we understand something as huge as a global epidemic? Similarly to Covid, the AIDS epidemic, which was most destructive in the 1980s and 90s, had such universal reach. Yet within that, there were millions of personal experiences. What was it like to work on the frontline w ... Show More
59m 33s
Feb 2022
LGBT history special
In the 1990s, doctors in Berlin began a cutting-edge treatment programme that led to a patient being cured of HIV/AIDS. The so-called "Berlin patient" was Timothy Ray Brown: he was suffering from leukemia as well as HIV/AIDS, and was given a bone marrow transplant from a donor wi ... Show More
50m 8s
Apr 2021
HIV/AIDS and Stigma (with Peter Staley, Jonathan Van Ness & Dr. Oni Blackstock)
When HIV was first identified in the early 1980s, it was a public health crisis mired in urgent scientific questions: How was it transmitted? What were the symptoms? Could it be treated? But alongside that, and equally challenging to public health, was the stigma attached to the ... Show More
54m 23s
Dec 2021
40 years later, stigma still overshadows HIV prevention
In 1981, the first case of the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) was diagnosed. The virus that causes AIDS, became a thing to be feared for people in the LGBTQ+ community, who also became a scapegoat for its existence. On World AIDS Day, we remember that even when things have ch ... Show More
23m 18s
Jun 2020
Aux origines du VIH-Sida
Remontons aux origines de la pandémie du VIH-Sida qui a fait 36 millions de morts dans le monde. Quand et comment ce virus est-il passé du singe à l’homme ? Une longue histoire, complexe retracée par le virologue Ahidjo Ayouba de l’Institut de recherche pour le développement (IRD ... Show More
3m 33s
Oct 2020
The Fight Against AIDS | The Epidemic Begins | S37-E1
In the early 1980s, a mysterious new disease spread like wildfire through the gay communities of major U.S. cities. Before it even had a name, AIDS had already killed over half its victims. Public response was hampered by ignorance, fear, and homophobia. This is the story of the ... Show More
42m 23s
Aug 2020
The Pandemic Feels Like Déjà Vu For Some Survivors of the HIV/AIDS Crisis
At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Jesus Guillen overheard a woman ask why those being held on the Grand Princess cruise ship docked at the Oakland Port with COVID-19 couldn’t just be sent to an island somewhere. It reminded him immediately of another crisis he lived thro ... Show More
19m 11s
Jun 2022
HIV/AIDS Advocacy | 72
In 1992 HIV/AIDS hit a grim milestone in the United States when it became the number one cause of death among men ages 25 to 44. Since there was still so much stigma attached to the illness, people were often dying without even telling their closest friends and family that they w ... Show More
42m 47s
Listen to millions of songs and podcasts on Anghami