Far from the world without AIDS that Vito Russo had imagined: “After we kick the shit out of this disease, we're all going to be alive to kick the shit out of this system”.
In the 80s, people started getting sick with symptoms of pneumonia and with their bodies covered in sores and spots caused by Kaposi's sarcoma. The deaths unleashed hysteria and panic. Many died without medical attention, rejected by the hospitals and by their environment, fired from their jobs and evicted from their homes. They were condemned by two plagues — that of an unnamed disease and by gossip that said you could be infected with a simple handshake or by breathing in the same air as an infected person. By the time Reagan first uttered the word 'AIDS' in a speech, more than 25,000 people had already died.