Transfusion and the AIDS sociology of a national drama

France was the first European country to decide to screen blood donors and set up blood tests for AIDS. French research workers were also the first to isolate the AIDS virus. This should have made France a leader in the field in the struggle against the AIDS epidemic. Instead, thousands of lives have been lost, and huge sums of money have been spent in compensating patients who were contaminated by blood transfusions. This important research has been discredited, and a large group of political and administrative decision-makers has been challenged in an unprecedented scandal. Michel Setbon analyses this fiasco whose causes were outrageously simplified by the media and ignored by the judicial system.