ABSTRACT
One of the striking features of AIDS is that, unlike the plague of the Middle Ages with which it is sometimes compared, it is occurring in a period where a belief in 'science' is dominant, even if the sciences themselves are undergoing considerable soul-searching about the nature of their expertise. The first reaction to reports of a new, as yet unnamed, syndrome related to an apparent collapse of the immune system was to search for a biological agent, not, as might have happened in earlier times, a religious or social causation. In those societies where older forms of explanation might have been invoked the carriers of modern scientific discourse were quickly harnessed to 'educate' people in basic virology: one of the interesting aspects of the epidemic is that fundamentalist Christians in the United States and villagers in tropical Africa often shared a common suspicion of such rationalist 'science', and prefered to explain AIDS in terms of existing belief systems. The ranks of medical experts and health care professionals were mobilized to explain, define and control the new epidemic, and by and large the community sector has accepted the central role of biomedical research.
