LavenderRed_Cubabook

Cuba brought science, not
scapegoating, to AIDS care
Cuba tried to isolate the spread of AIDS as soon as the epidemic appeared in the
island population, explained then-Cuban Deputy Public Health Minister Hector
Terry in 1987. But Cuba did not try to socially isolate people with AIDS.
Terry stressed of Cubans living in the sanatoria, “They visit their families at home,
go out on pass; their families visit them, every day. Their friends can visit them.”
(Wald)
Cuba attempted to quarantine the spread of the epidemic based on a scientific
approach to a medical emergency, without using scapegoating to isolate people with
AIDS.
In the U.S., AIDS activists had to fight a protracted battle to replace the bigoted label
of “high-risk groups” with a rational understanding of “high-risk behaviors.” Cuban medical
workers and educators approached transmission scientifically.
Arguelles and Rich observed in the autumn of 1987 that, “Cuba is unusual in publicizing
the disease, not as a gay disease, but rather as a sexually transmitted disease regardless
of specific sexual practice.”
The primary route of AIDS transmission in Cuba was via international contact, including
Cubans who had worked or studied abroad.
Of the first 99 people quarantined in 1986, only about 20 percent were believed to
have contracted AIDS through same-sex contact.
Terry articulated this clearly: “We are carrying out our program by giving the public
a lot of scientific information, speaking to them clearly about the modes of transmission
and not generating phenomena such as homophobia or sexual repression.
“In some countries the mass media, for commercial reasons, generate those phenomena
to sell more magazines or newspapers. But we don’t need to sell more magazines or
newspapers. We don’t need to use AIDS to get people to watch more TV or to get some
corporation to finance AIDS research. We don’t need any of that here.”
Terry summed up, “We start from the ideas that AIDS is transmitted not because of
what you are but because of what you do, and therefore there’s no reason to generate any
kind of persecution or phobia against any patient.”
Interviewer Karen Wald added, “Members of the gay community interviewed here
said there has been no increase in homophobia or attacks on gays as a result of AIDS.
Cuba brought science, not scapegoating, to AIDS care 53