1986

January 16: The U.S. Center for Disease Control (CDC) reports that more people were diagnosed with AIDS in 1985 than in all earlier years combined. The 1985 figures show an 89% increase in new AIDS cases compared with 1984. Of all AIDS cases to date, 51% of adults and 59% of children have died. The new report shows that, on average, AIDS patients die about 15 months after the disease is diagnosed. Public health experts predict twice as many new AIDS cases in 1986.

February 5: President Reagan announces he has asked Dr. C. Everett Koop, the U.S. Surgeon General, to prepare a "major report" on AIDS. The President says his Administration is committed to finding a cure for the disease. Meanwhile the White House proposes a 22% reduction in current funding for AIDS research, despite the fact that ~17,000 Americans have AIDS and over half (8,801) have died of it.

February 21: Ryan White returns to classes at Western Middle School.

March 18 : Conservative New York Times columnist William F. Buckley, Jr. calls for tattooing all people with AIDS : “Everyone detected with AIDS should be tattooed in the upper forearm, to protect common-needle users, and on the buttocks, to prevent the victimization of other homosexuals.”

March 26 : The Bureau of National Affairs, Inc. and Public Broadcasting Service co-host the first national teleconference on AIDS in the Workplace. The 3-hour event is transmitted from Washington, DC, to more than 100 sites nationwide.

May 1 : The International Committee on the Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) announces the official name of the virus that causes AIDS: “Human Immunodeficiency Virus” (HIV). ,

June 10: The National Minority AIDS Council is formally established in Boston, Massachusetts, at the conclusion of a two-day meeting on people of color and AIDS sponsored by the National Institute of Mental Health and the National Lesbian and Gay Health Foundation. The Reverend Carl Bean, a member of the new council and director of the Minority AIDS Project in Los Angeles, says the Council will serve as a vehicle to "express and address the needs" of people of color with AIDS.

July 18 : At the National Conference on AIDS in the Black Community in Washington, DC, a group of minority leaders meets with the U.S. Surgeon General, Dr. C. Everett Koop, to discuss concerns about HIV/AIDS in communities of color.

August 9 : The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) accuses an employer of illegally discriminating against a person with AIDS for the first time. The HHS Office of Civil Rights finds that a North Carolina hospital violated a man's civil rights by dismissing him from his job as a registered nurse and then refusing to consider him for any other job. HHS bases the case on Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of handicap in any program or activity that receives federal financial assistance.

September 28—October 2 : The American Public Health Association hosts its 114th annual conference in Las Vegas, Nevada. This is the first APHA conference to host a plenary session on AIDS. Activists are angry that all the panelists for the session are white, so Craig Harris—a Black gay man living with HIV—storms the plenary stage shouting “I will be heard!”

October 1 : The U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) begins its AIDS Service Demonstration Grants program—the agency’s first AIDS-specific health initiative. In the program’s first year, HRSA makes $15.3 million available to four of the country’s hardest-hit cities: New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Miami.

October 22 : The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation creates the AIDS Health Services Program, providing $17.2 million in funding for patient-care demonstration projects in 11 cities. The goal is to replicate the San Francisco Model of Care nationwide—but with an emphasis on tailoring programs to meet the needs in local contexts[PDF, 244KB].

October 22: The Surgeon General issues the Surgeon General’s Report on AIDS [PDF, 3MB]. The report makes it clear that HIV cannot be spread casually and calls for: a nationwide education campaign (including early sex education in schools); increased use of condoms; and voluntary HIV testing.

October 24: CDC reports that AIDS cases are disproportionately affecting African Americans and Latinos. This is particularly true for African American and Latinx children, who make up 90% of perinatally acquired AIDS cases.

October 29 : The Institute of Medicine (IOM), the principal health unit of the National Academy of Sciences, issues a report, Confronting AIDS: Directions for Public Health, Health Care, and Research. The report calls for a “massive media, educational and public health campaign to curb the spread of the HIV infection,” as well as for the creation of a National Commission on AIDS. The IOM estimates that the effort will require a $2 billion investment in research and patient care by the end of the decade.

November 21 : The World Health Organization announces today that it has begun the first coordinated global effort to combat AIDS, a disease WHO officials describe as "a health disaster of pandemic proportions."

November 28 : The U.S. State Department announces that Foreign Service applicants, officers, and their dependents will be tested for HIV beginning January 1, 1987. Those who test positive for HIV will automatically be rejected from consideration for Foreign Service positions. It is the first time a civilian government agency orders screening for HIV as a condition for employment.

October 22: The Surgeon General issues the Surgeon General’s Report on AIDS [PDF, 3MB]. The report makes it clear that HIV cannot be spread casually and calls for a nationwide education campaign (including early sex education in schools); increased use of condoms; and voluntary HIV testing.

October 24: CDC reports that AIDS cases are disproportionately affecting African Americans and Latinos. This is particularly true for African American and Latinx children, who make up 90% of perinatally acquired AIDS cases.

October 29: The Institute of Medicine (IOM), the principal health unit of the National Academy of Sciences, issues a report, Confronting AIDS: Directions for Public Health, Health Care, and Research. The report calls for a “massive media, educational and public health campaign to curb the spread of the HIV infection,” as well as for the creation of a National Commission on AIDS. The IOM estimates that the effort will require a $2 billion investment in research and patient care by the end of the decade.

November 21: The World Health Organization announces today that it has begun the first coordinated global effort to combat AIDS, a disease WHO officials describe as "a health disaster of pandemic proportions."

November 28: The U.S. State Department announces that Foreign Service applicants, officers, and their dependents will be tested for HIV beginning January 1, 1987. Those who test positive for HIV will automatically be rejected from consideration for Foreign Service positions. It is the first time a civilian government agency orders screening for HIV as a condition for employment.