After years of study, students still learning A IDS became the polio epidemic of the 1980s. Interviews with AIDS patients, afternoon TV movies and public-service commercials flooded airtime.
Rumors spread just as quickly as the media hype, giving the country quite a scare.
With no cure on the horizon, education on safe sex and AIDS became the first line of defense. Children from elementary school all the way through their high school graduation learned the scary facts about AIDS and how it was transmitted. Now in college, they know they can't contract AIDS from sharing a soda. Interviews with Binghamton University students and those who work with student health issues found that while students know the facts about AIDS, they don't always act like it. They still engage in risky behavior.