In the Papers: Media Coverage 

                                                                                                                                                                                          nj.com

             Another resource that could be immeasurably significant in the course of the AIDS epidemic is the media. Over the course of the epidemic, hundreds of articles have been published in the local newspapers, The Star-Ledger and The New York Times. The articles have been in the first few sections of the paper, mainly the first section, “In the Towns”, and “New Jersey”. It is extremely rare to find AIDS-related articles on the front pages of sections; the vast majority are found a few pages in. The social stigma of AIDS being a “gay disease” caused the media to not address the epidemic as it grew during the early 1980s. Articles began to address the mysterious disease once it began to afflict those in the mainstream population, like hemophiliacs and babies who had received blood transfusions.⁸ With the “gay disease” in the blood supply, the general population became alarmed, and so the newspapers reported accordingly.  In the mid-1980s, researchers did a study on a family in Newark and concluded that AIDS could be spread by casual, day-to-day contact; this report incited terror across the nation. Parents were concerned that their children would “catch” AIDS like the common cold from their peers in school.  For the next few years, until December of 1985 and January of 1986, the newspapers printed stories on a somewhat regular basis which still questioned the ways in which HIV could be transmitted. The debate had come to a head a few months before when school districts in Essex County considered closing their doors to students who had tested positive for HIV or had been diagnosed with AIDS. The issues of infringement of the right to an education and the well being of other students came head to head because some health officials with poorly conducted or faulty research publicized their claims and incited fear in the public.  Only after many studies were published that proved that classroom contact would not transmit the virus did the debate subside.

            In recent years, since definitive research has reached true conclusions about the transmission and characteristics of the virus, media coverage has “cooled off”. Instead of reporting local HIV/AIDS concerns, the media began to mask the local problem by only reporting significant research and the developing AIDS crisis in other parts of the world, most notably Africa. In the past few months, the only articles that addressed the local AIDS problem were a Star-Ledger article regarding HIV testing that was published on World AIDS Day in December,⁹ an article covering an HIV transmission scandal during the fall,¹⁰ and a three day series of articles on the AIDS epidemic that was published during the summer.¹¹ All other articles mention global AIDS efforts, including features on President Clinton’s international campaign and the U.N.’s statement that AIDS numbers are rising worldwide;¹² the only mention of the local problem features a story on Union County, which has a significantly smaller problem than Essex.¹³ By not addressing, or “ignoring,” the local AIDS problem and needle exchange debate, the newspapers, specifically The Star-Ledger create the illusion that there isn’t a problem.  Indeed, local efforts to fight the epidemic are focused abroad, not on the home front.¹⁴ There is no chance of reducing the risks or halting the epidemic if the media outlets don’t make the general public aware of the issue at hand.

                                                                                                          nytimes.com