ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a prolegomena to the study of the medico-moral dimensions of acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) in Uganda. It describes the deliberate efforts of a small group of adolescents, college students, to halt the process as they experienced it in the post-colonial present. The students imitated the professional labeling of the international AIDS community and their government in viewing their organization as an “AIDS control” association but its name made it clear that it drew explicitly on the university’s undergraduate community for its task force. Something of a chasm lies between a biomedical recognition of an AIDS patient and an anthropological recognition of a person with AIDS. Attention must be drawn to the methodological shortcomings of some social science research on the AIDS epidemic in Africa. The behavior of Ugandans was seen as responsible for the introduction and spread of the AIDS pandemic and as a constraint on policy makers and medical experts.
