David's post about the rise in Google searches for "coronavirus beer," "corona virus beer," and "virus corona beer" in the last few days, brings to mind the sad fate of Ayds.
Ayds (pronounced aids) was a popular appetite-suppressant candy from the 1930s-1980s. When public awareness about AIDS grew in the mid-80s, sales of Ayds declined. Eventually Ayds went out of business. From Wikipedia:
By the mid-1980s, public awareness of the disease AIDS caused problems for the brand due to the phonetic similarity of names and the fact that the disease caused immense weight loss in patients. While initially sales were not affected, by 1988 the chair of Dep Corporation announced that the company was seeking a new name because sales had dropped as much as 50% due to publicity about the disease.[3] While the product's name was changed to Diet Ayds (Aydslim in Britain), it was eventually withdrawn from the market.
(Side note: I like the mod music in the commercial that starts at 1:55)
