SOURCE: "Unhealthy Resistance," in The Nation, New York, Vol. 245, No. 15, November 7, 1987, pp. 526-28.

Greenberg is an American journalist, critic, and editor and publisher of Science and Government Report, a newsletter that analyzes American politics, particularly as related to science and health issues. In the following review, he offers praise for And the Band Played On.

When the files and memoirs become available, all long wars are revealed to have been badly fought. It could not be otherwise with the AIDS epidemic, given the disease's stealthy spread, the outcast populations it initially struck and its scientific intractability. Most important, however, was a horrific coincidence: the simultaneous arrival in the United States in 1981 of an uncompassionate, overtly homophobic presidency and a mysterious, fatal affliction transmitted mainly through the sex practices of male homosexuals. The ingredients for calamity were abundant, and the forces opposing them turned out to be feeble.

The...