Advocates Share Ideas in Teaching About AIDS

By MARC LACEY and LAWRENCE K. ALTMAN
MEXICO CITY, 11 AUG 2008 — Like most scientific conferences, the 17th International AIDS Conference, which ended here on Friday, had its share of researchers presenting and discussing the findings of multiyear investigations in clinical terms.
There was “a ‘planting and eating soybean’ project for people living with H.I.V./AIDS in rural Anhui, China,” “situational analysis and client satisfaction evaluation of A.R.T. centers in India” and “coordinating procurement planning using logistics data,” to name but a few such studies.
Mixed among the strait-laced scientists, though, were activists wearing condom costumes and T-shirts that asked, “Got AIDS?”
More than a quarter of a century since the AIDS epidemic was first recognized, the advocates say, they must be increasingly imaginative in their efforts to educate the public about the disease. Posters on display showed condom-shaped superheroes sailing through the air and oversize insects, representing the virus, having sex with unsuspecting victims. The worst thing, those involved in drawing attention to the epidemic say, is to be so dull that people’s eyes glaze over.
“There is a need to renew and freshen efforts because the virus does not get bored, nor does it fail to find new people at risk every year,” said Dr. James W. Curran, who led the AIDS Program at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for many years before becoming dean of the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University.
One attention-getting advertising campaign on display — called “If I were H.I.V. positive...” — was created by a French group called AIDES. For two years, AIDES has printed posters and postcards and created advertisements using photographs of prominent people above questions meant to challenge stereotypes about infected people.
“If I were H.I.V. positive, would you let me be your doctor?” says one ad bearing the likeness of Dr. Pedro Cahn, the immediate past president of the International AIDS Society, which ran the meeting.
Another showing a blonde woman asked, “If I were H.I.V. positive, would you invite me to your home?” The picture was of Crown Princess Mette-Marit of Norway.
After former President Bill Clinton gave the keynote address on Monday, Floriane Cutler, an AIDES staff member, ducked under a rope and handed him a poster that the group had prepared of him in the hope that he would approve its distribution.
“Would I ever have been president of the United States, if I were H.I.V. positive?” it read. The group used a photo of Mr. Clinton that it had downloaded from the Internet.
Ms. Cutler said Mr. Clinton listened to her quick spiel about the idea behind the antistigma campaign, smiled at her and then moved along with a copy of the poster in his hand.
During France’s presidential campaign last year, the group printed posters of all the candidates. Nicolas Sarkozy, who eventually won, was the toughest to deal with, the group said. His representatives did not initially respond to the questionnaire they were sent seeking his positions on AIDS-related issues or approve an ad campaign.
So the group pressed him into it with a poster that asked: “Even though I don’t care about AIDS, will you vote for me?”
In Mr. Clinton’s case, the group has no plans to issue such a challenge. Olivier Denoue, deputy managing director of AIDES, said Mr. Clinton’s foundation was doing important work on combating AIDS in the developing world and that the former president was regarded as a leader in the field. But the group is eager for an answer on whether he will join the actors, sports figures and other celebrities, most of them French, who are already part of the advertising campaign.
And AIDES is already preparing a backup plan in case Mr. Clinton, whose office did not respond to a request for comment on the campaign, says no.
“If we don’t get Bill Clinton,” Ms. Cutler said, “maybe we’ll get Madonna or Barack Obama or Sharon Stone.”