Action on AIDS gallery, Against the Odds; Making a Difference in Global Health, Exhibition at the National Library of Medicine, 2008-2010. Courtesy of the National Library of Medicine
In recent years there has been a resurgence of museum exhibitions on the history of HIV and AIDS. In the article Public health heritage and policy: HIV and AIDS in museums and archives, exhibition curator and historian of medicine Manon S. Parry, Professor at the VU-University, Amsterdam, calls into question some of the conventions of archiving and interpreting the history of the pandemic.
In the article, published in the dossier The meaning(s) of global public health history, Perry highlights some significant problems in the management of the material culture of the pandemic: Firstly, collections policies place limits on the kinds of objects that qualify for museum accession, and many are inadequate for addressing HIV and AIDS. Secondly, medical heritage is vulnerable if it is not considered valuable for contemporary practice. Thirdly, museums replicate the silences and erasures of the societies they document, with groups on the margins, such as intravenous drug users and sex workers, underrepresented.
Parry, Manon Sian. Public health heritage and policy: HIV and AIDS in museums and archives. História, Ciências, Saúde-Manguinhos [online]. 2020, v. 27, suppl 1.
Read more about HIV and Aids in HCS-Manguinhos:
A global player in the politics of Aids: Marcos Cueto, science editor of HCSM, and Gabriel Lopes, postdoctoral researcher at Casa de Oswaldo Cruz (Fiocruz), explore the Brazilian participation in international debates on whether antiretroviral drugs were commodities or public goods.
HIV/AIDS, its stigma and history Our science editors André Felipe Cândido da Silva and Marcos Cueto discuss the HIV prevention policy adopted in Brazil since December 2017: the pre-exposure prophylaxis.
AIDS Between Science and Politics Peter Piot, founding executive director of UNAIDS, recounts his experience as a clinician, scientist, and activist fighting the disease from its earliest manifestation to today.
Successes and setbacks in the fight against Aids The medical anthropologist Richard Parker, professor at Columbia University, examines the social and political aspects of HIV/AIDS in Latin America.
