The Challenge of Getting Attention for Global AIDS

Monday, September 12. 2005

The global AIDS epidemic is incessant and predictably horrible -- which is to say it isn't very newsworthy. Media (and political) attention focuses on the new, and unfortunately global AIDS is an old story. Keyword searches on Google News illustrate the challenge:

"Katrina": 404,000 entries
"Iraq": 165,000 entries
"Gaza": 62,000 entries
"Roberts": 50,000 entries
"HIV": 10,000 entries

In a competition of just these five terms, "HIV" gets slightly over 1% of current press attention.

Unfortunately, it is difficult to push global AIDS higher in the mainstream media or political agendas, despite characterizing it as a "Katrina every day" or "tsunami every week". The best hope for providing ongoing emphasis on global AIDS may be through the web and blogosphere, where large numbers of dedicated posters can keep the issue prominent for journalists, politicians, and the public.

Posted by Jim Cashel in New Ideas at 01:34 | Comment (1) | Trackbacks (0)

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You're absolutely right. Relative to the amount of suffering caused by AIDS, news coverage is practically nonexistant. It's out there for people who are looking hard enough for it, but for the population-at-large it is out of sight and out of mind.

Doing my part,
-Brad

#1 Brad (Homepage) on 2005-09-14 09:58 (Reply)

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AIDS Matters

AIDS Matters is a Web resource for global AIDS professionals managed by Jim Cashel with the assistance of others. It is sponsored by Forum One Communications, a Washington, DC web strategy firm.