1986

January 16 – The CDC reports that 1985 saw an 89 percent increase in AIDS diagnoses from 1984, and predicts that the number will double in 1986.

May 1 – The International Committee on the Taxonomy of Viruses officially gives the name Human Immunodeficiency Virus, or HIV, to the virus that causes AIDS.

July 18 – A group of minority community leaders meet with Surgeon General C. Everett Koop to voice concerns about HIV/AIDS in communities of color, unofficially founding the National Minority AIDS Council.

November – In the Life: A Black Gay Anthology, the first collection of writings about the AIDS crisis from 29 Black, gay authors, is published. The book receives little mainstream attention at publication, but goes down in history as a watershed moment in gay literature.

1987 

February – Cleve Jones creates the first panel of the AIDS Memorial Quilt in honor of his friend Marvin Feldman, who died of an AIDS-related illness the previous October. Jones makes the panel three feet by six feet, the standard size of a grave plot, intending it and subsequent panels to serve as a way of remembering, grieving and celebrating the lives of people who have died from AIDS in a society where many families refused to acknowledge their cause of death and some funeral homes and cemeteries refused to handle their remains. The project becomes the NAMES Project.

February 4 – Legendary pianist Liberace dies of an AIDS-related illness. His doctor claims that Liberace, who had long denied rumors that he was gay, died of a heart attack. A week later, the actual cause of his death is revealed.

March 12 – Kramer helps found the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power, or ACT UP, a direct-action group that pressures officials, governments, pharmaceutical companies, and other institutions to protect those at risk of HIV and those who have contracted it. The organization’s motto is “Silence = Death.” ACT UP begins agitating for increased access to experimental medications, as well as a coordinated national AIDS response.

March 19 – The FDA approves AZT, the first medication for treat AIDS. The treatment does not cure HIV-AIDS, but can be used to slow its progress and prevent transmission in some instances, such as during birth. The FDA also adjusts regulations to expand access to experimental medications.

March 31 – President Reagan and Prime Minister Jacques Chirac of France agree their countries will share credit for the discovery of HIV.

May 15 – The Public Health Service adds HIV to its immigration exclusion list. For the next 23 years, visa applicants are required to take a blood test and may be denied entry to the U.S. if they test positive.

May 31 – Reagan gives his first speech about AIDS. On June 24, he creates the first Presidential Commission on AIDS.

August 5 – A federal judge rules that a Florida school board cannot ban three HIV-positive brothers, Ricky, Robert, and Randy Ray, from attending school. The community of Arcadia, Florida responds with death threats, bomb threats and a school boycott.

August 18 – The FDA green-lights the first human test of a candidate vaccine against HIV.

August 28 – After weeks of threats following a ruling that they could not be banned from school for being HIV-positive, the home of brothers Ricky, Robert, and Randy Ray is burned to the ground while the family is staying elsewhere. The Rays later announce that they will leave Arcadia.

October 1 – The first national AIDS Awareness Month begins, with the CDC launching a massive public education campaign that warns “everyone is at risk.”

October 11 – The NAMES Project displays its AIDS Memorial Quilt on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. for the first time. The Quilt bears the names of 1,920 people who died of AIDS-related illnesses when it is first displayed—the number eventually grows to over 10,000, making the Quilt the largest piece of community folk art in the world.