Wed, 01/16/2019 - 10:30 gkellett
An ACT-UP poster for the SILENCE = DEATH campaign, 1987.
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ACT-UP, The AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power via Wellcome Collection under CC BY-NC 4.0
2001

Azidothymidine (AZT) became the first anti-HIV drug approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). While the development of AZT was groundbreaking, it needed to be taken at exact times around the clock, including in the middle of the night. This limited its effectiveness in countries where alarm clocks weren’t a daily part of life. AZT also cost about $9,000 a year—more than $21,000 when adjusted for inflation. But perhaps most important, AZT didn’t even guarantee survival—it could only delay the progression of AIDS.

Timeline Entry Prefix
1987