Cover of Patient Zero and the Making of the AIDS Epidemic, courtesy of Isaac Tobin and the University of Chicago Press, 2017.
The search for a “patient zero”—popularly understood to be the first person infected in an epidemic—has been key to media coverage of major infectious-disease outbreaks for more than three decades. Yet the term itself did not exist before the emergence of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the 1980s.
At this event, historian Richard A. McKay will read selections from his 2017 book Patient Zero and the Making of the AIDS Epidemic (Chicago University Press, 2017), which examined how this idea came to exert such a strong grip on the scientific, media and popular consciousness. The book, which used materials in the GLBT Historical Society’s archives, focuses on the life of Gaétan Dugas, a gay man who received widespread posthumous infamy when he was incorrectly identified as patient zero of the North American AIDS outbreak. McKay will also engage in a conversation with historian Gerard Koskovich about his archival research and take audience questions.
SPEAKERS
Richard A. McKay is a Wellcome Trust Research Fellow in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge. He received his master’s and doctorate at the University of Oxford and was an ESRC Postdoctoral Fellow at King’s College, London. McKay currently works part-time as a research fellow, spending the rest of his working time in private practice as a credentialed career/academic/life coach, accredited by the International Coach Federation. Since 2012 he has served on the executive committee of the Society for the Social History of Medicine, and in 2019 was elected a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.
Gerard Koskovich is a San Francisco public historian and rare book dealer. A founding member of the GLBT Historical Society, he has been active in the movement to create LGBTQ archives and museums for nearly four decades and has curated numerous exhibitions. Koskovich has presented widely, including talks at the Ecole du Louvre, Kyoto University and Oxford University, and has published extensively in English and French. Most recently he has focused on the work of Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld (1868–1935); the history of queer history in the United States; and LGBTQ place-based history.
HOW TO PARTICIPATE
This event will take place online. After you register, you will receive a confirmation email with a link and instructions on how to join the Zoom webinar as an attendee. The event will also be livestreamed on our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/GLBTHistory/ and then archived on our YouTube page at https://bit.ly/2UyGVbG.
ADMISSION
Free | Suggested donation of $5.00
Register online here: https://bit.ly/30Y97H0
The event is limited to 500 attendees.
ASL INTERPRETATION
ASL interpretation provided upon request. Please write at least three days in advance of event to leigh@glbthistory.org.
ABOUT THE BOOK
For more information about Patient Zero and the Making of the AIDS Epidemic, visit the publisher’s website here. The University of Chicago Press is currently offering a 20 percent discount on the purchase price of the book; simply enter MCKAY20 as the promo code when prompted during checkout on the website.
JOIN THE GLBT HISTORICAL SOCIETY
Become a member of the GLBT Historical Society for free museum and program admission, discounts in the museum shop and other perks: www.glbthistory.org/memberships.