And What About HIV?

"If you're not infected, you're affected."

These words are among many that struck deep at an AIDS awareness event last Wednesday. As part of the HIV education sector,  I was poised to ask my favorite "development work" questions and drink my support in red wine. What I got instead was a call to activism.

Speaker Jeff Fard kicked off the night by getting us to think about perceptions. It wasn't difficult. A black man talking about AIDS in a predominantly white upper-middle class town unconsciously stirs many perceptions. And when he reversed the situation, asking about others' perceptions of us, the crowd was quick to point out we were actually in Edwards, not Vail, and many work hard for their money.  But, back to perceptions and what this has to do with AIDS.

As many of you know, HIV/AIDS was originally termed a "gay disease" in the 80s. GRID or Gay-Related Immune Deficiency to be exact. No judgement towards those early scientists and doctors that first identified the virus. Thousands had already died of AIDs and today research traces the virus prior to 1924. But at the time GRID "made sense." In 1981 patients in California and New York surfaced with rare forms of pneumonia and other symptoms unresponsive to regular treatment. Most of these patients had two things in common: their sexuality and the indication of some other common illness. Eventually doctors considered the possibility it was transmitted sexually, and people realized it affected the entire population, not just gays.

Jeff was working at Mercy Hospital in Denver during those years. Before we identified modes of transmission, they burned those who died. Bodies, and everything they touched, were wrapped in red plastic bags and taken to the incinerator. Nurses and doctors were afraid to touch the infected. It was a crisis, but no one knew of what or how to address it.

What Jeff pointed out, however, was how much we owe to the gay community from that time. Yes, a group isolated sexually from the rest of society, is what allowed us to identify HIV. More than that though, was the group's response to the crisis. Perhaps partly because of stigmas attached to homosexuality at the time. Or because of the perception that HIV was a gay disease. Nevertheless, they were activists. Activists that held and supported each other. Activists that brought attention to a global epidemic. Activists that banned together to fight for their lives. And being activists had less to do with being gay, more to do with being human.

It's easy to look at HIV as epidemic of the poor, the black community, or another country. It's easy to look at the 20% in global reductions last year. It's easy to say we know how to protect it, and we're getting the crisis under control. But in the U.S., 1 in 5 people with HIV are unaware of their positive status. D.C. has a prevalence rate similar to countries in central and west Africa. Whether you work with gangs, corporations, little kids, or politicians, HIV is there. Jeff is right, we're infected or we're affected. HIV is a global epidemic, and that means it's a personal one as well.

I left the event thinking about the people who inspire me most, or even the ones I merely sit in awe of. The founders of our organization, who at 19 and 20, fought for a kid's right to life-saving information. A college friend who stood up at homelessness conference of 400 people to call out a gay-bashing comment. My students in India who tracked us down to find out how they could start an awareness club. A man in Cambodia who spends his days risking his life to de-mine the fields in which he planted land mines as a child soldier in the 60s. The people who wake up every day to face the harshness of this discouraging world believing that today they will make a difference.

We're students. We're volunteers. We're educators. But most importantly, we're also activists. I think we forget that sometimes. And as activists, let's ask the question I was challenged to that night. Wherever you are, whoever you're with, and whatever you're discussing, ask, "And what about HIV?"