And the Band Played On: Politics, People, and the AIDS Epidemic

by Randy Shilts

The CDC wasn’t impressed with the complacent outlook of health officials, given the fact that it was common knowledge that Manhattan gay doctors weren’t reporting many of their cases because of the confidentiality dispute with the CDC. Dr. Richard Selik of the AIDS Activities Office responded to the reports of New York AIDS decreases by ordering an investigation on local reporting practices. In the end, it turned out that the rate of AIDS cases wasn’t decreasing in New York but was increasing there as fast as elsewhere in the country. This did not deter the state and city health officials from continuing to announce, at virtually every juncture of the epidemic, that the rate of new AIDS cases was “leveling.”