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Table 1 Mentions of AIDS with illustrative quotations, classified by major themes, selected UK newspapers, 1981–1985

From: Informal knowledge transfer in the period before formal health education programmes: case studies of mass media coverage of HIV and SIDS in England and Wales

Early coverage

"AIDS contagious and spreads sexually" [13]

"Latest research does indicate that AID could very possibly be spread through a virus, which makes it a sexually transmitted disease" [14]

Uncertainty and fear over the future course of AIDS epidemic

"Now spread to other groups, fears may reach to London" [37]

"Inexorable extension into general population" [38]

"Serious fear of spreading abroad [from US]" [39]

"Death of victims slow and terrible" [39]

"Fears that the true number of cases of AIDS in Britain may be much higher" [40]

"First hard evidence that...contracted by non-homosexuals" [41]

"Fear may jump to straight population" [42]

"[on the gay community] feeling of isolation and separation" [42]

Headline: "Gay plague kills gran" [43]

"Terrified of contact with sufferers [Headline: Gay sex bug victims are lepers] " [44]

Transmission route

"First thought to be only sexually transmitted" [45]

"Sexually transmissible killer disease" [46]

"Transmissible agent in blood or semen" [47]

Risky behaviours identified

"[homosexuals] vulnerable and promiscuous population" [38]

"[referring to less cases in the UK than the USA] less extreme promiscuity and little multiple drug use, both believed to be factors in spread" [42]

"Promiscuity as...revolutionary sexual brotherhood...genuine fears for health put on defensive" [42]

"Chastity may become latest fashion" [48]

"Indiscriminate promiscuity" [39]

"Take fewer partners, but not necessarily have less sex" [16]