The embodiment of inequality

The Thirteenth International AIDS Conference, which took place in Durban from 9 to 14 July 2000, was the first to be held in a city in the developing world. It showed that the international scientific and political communities are now ready to face the serious situation in developing countries, first and foremost those in Africa. And, as the title proclaimed, the conference sought to ‘break the silence’ surrounding such crucial issues as infection statistics and the social exclusion of patients, and also the lack of mobilization among rich nations on access to drug treatment. In this context, the choice of South Africa, which had only returned to democracy six years before from the apartheid regime, was highly symbolic.However, as the event approached, the tension mounted among the medical world and advocacy groups. For several months, South Africa's President, Thabo Mbeki, had been open to the theories of some Western researchers who denied the causal relationship between viruses and infection. He had even invited some of them to a panel and had temporarily stopped all mother‐to‐child transmission prevention programmes on the grounds that the medication used was harmful (Schneider, 2002; Fassin, 2002a). In response to Mbeki's actions, some participants considered not attending the meeting, fearing that their presence would seem to condone this dissident assessment. The conference did finally take place, but Thabo Mbeki's opening speech was given to a half‐empty auditorium after most participants had ostensively left.Hans Holbein the Younger (1497–1543) Die Abtisinn (The Abbess) from the Bilder des Todes (Pictures of Death) series; woodcut by Hans Lutzelburger and Veit Specklin; 6.5 × 4.8 cm; with permission from Public Art Collection Basel, Switzerland.![][1] The South African President declared that he had wondered long and hard about what could explain the virulence of the AIDS virus that was … [1]: /embed/graphic-1.gif