Tag: HIV/AIDS

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On this day in 1985, Rock Hudson passed away at 59 years old

Rock Hudson was one of Hollywood’s premier leading men in the 50s and early 60s, though sadly, he is perhaps most notable for being the first major U.S. celebrity to die of complications from AIDS.

He made his big screen debut in 1948, but muddled around in bit parts for years  until 1955′s Magnificent Obsession. The following year’s Giant, co-starring fellow queer film icons Elizabeth Taylor and James Dean, proved Hudson to be a strong dramatic actor (and earned him an Oscar nomination) while he found even more success in a series of romantic comedies with Doris Day, starting with 1959′s Pillow Talk.

While Hudson was enjoying being the nation’s top box office draw in the 1950s and 60s, he and  Wilson were busy covering up Hudson’s homosexuality. Hudson’s homosexuality was a well-kept secret in Hollywood, resulting in a sham marriage to Wilson’s secretary, Phyllis Gates.

His health began to decline in 1981 and worsened with his diagnosis of HIV on June 5, 1984. On July 25, 1985, Hudson became the first major public figure to announce he had AIDS. September 19 of that year, Hudson, too sick to attend a special AIDS fundraiser, sent the following telegram:

“I am not happy that I am sick. I am not happy that I have AIDS. But if that is helping others, I can at least know that my own misfortune has had some positive worth.”

Hudson died in his sleep on October 2, 1985. He was 59.

Remarking on the late screen idol, Morgan Fairchild said “Rock Hudson’s death gave AIDS a face.”

(source)

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UN Official: AIDS epidemic could end in less than 20 years

Thanks to treatment, control and prevention, a leading AIDS advocate believes the epidemic side of HIV/AIDS could be passed by 2030.

Luis Loures, a deputy executive director of UNAIDS, the UN agency leading the fight against HIV/AIDS says “I think that 2030 is a viable target to say that we have reached the end of the epidemic. HIV will continue existing as a case here or there, but not at the epidemic level we have today.”

According to AFP, Loures was in Panama last week to to discuss AIDS strategy with UN agencies in Latin America. With three million new HIV infections and 1.7 million people deaths each year from complications due to AIDS, the epidemic is still very much an issue at hand.

But Loures is quick to trumpet the progress made in treating the disease and controlling infection.  AFP reports:

Two decades ago the average annual cost of treatment per person with HIV was $19,000 while today it is $150 thanks to generic drugs.

Moreover, people with HIV are getting treatment earlier, which retards the disease’s development. According to UNAIDS, the annual incidence of new infections has fallen 20 percent over the past decade, and in 25 countries, including 13 in sub-Saharan Africa, it has fallen by 50 percent. Over the past two years, the number of people who have obtained treatment for HIV has increased by 60 percent.

(via Queerty)

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Canadian HIV vaccine sees first phase trial success

The first phase trial results of a new HIV vaccine being developed at Western University show strong promise:

The first phase of trials wrapped up last month, with researchers optimistic about the vaccine’s future.

“We infect the cells with a genetically modified HIV-1,” team leader Dr. Chil-Yong Kang told Ontario Business Report. “The infected cells produce lots of virus, which we collect, purify and inactivate so that the vaccine won’t cause AIDS in recipients, but will trigger immune responses.”

Sumagen, the South Korean biotech firm sponsoring the vaccine, cited manufacturing, as well as USFDA requirements as hurdles in bringing the vaccine to market, but, if all goes well in trials, it could be commercially available in five years.

“We are now prepared to take the next steps towards Phase II and Phase III clinical trials,” CEO Jung-Gee Cho said in a press release.

(source)

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Fire Island Dance Festival begins July 19th

The Fire Island Dance Festival returns July 19-21, and if you’ve not yet experienced it, this is the year. Performed outdoors against the background of the Fire Island Pines’ Great South Bay, this is one of the area’s great summer arts events.

Last year they raised more than $370,000 for Dancers Responding to AIDS, a program of Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, one of the nation’s leading industry-based, nonprofit AIDS fundraising and grant-making organizations.

“The Fire Island Dance Festival is a wonderful platform for so many artists to get to share their work with the Fire Island dance community,” says Kyle Abraham, one of the choreographers at this year’s show. “It’s just a wonderful venue — an opportunity to share your work.”

Starting at $125, with all proceeds going directly to the cause, showgoers can enjoy an open bar along with specially choreographed performances from renowned companies such as the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, The Broadway Dance Lab, and the Paul Taylor Dance Company.

“I want people to generally watch our work without any expectation,” Abraham says. “Because I’m always interested to see — whatever history you have before you watch our work, that’s always going to be embedded in how you’re viewing it.”
The weekend-long festival is produced by and benefits Dancers Responding to AIDS. Since its debut in 1995, Fire Island Dance Festival has raised more than $2.9 million.

More info and available tickets: https://www.dradance.org/ 

(via Advocate)

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American Medical Association supports ending gay blood ban

On Tuesday, the American Medical Association voted to end the 30 year ban on gay men donating blood.

“The lifetime ban on blood donation for men who have sex with men is discriminatory and not based on sound science,” AMA board member William Kobler said in a statement.

“This new policy urges a federal policy change to ensure blood donation bans or deferrals are applied to donors according to their individual level of risk and are not based on sexual orientation alone.”

The ban began in 1983 as a response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic, as patients were becoming infected through blood transfusions. However, with all blood now being tested, many believe the ban has become an outdated policy.

(via Advocate)

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Naughty postcard tease from “Broadway Bares 23: The United Strips of America”

The fab annual burlesque revue, Broadway Bares 23: United Strips of America, will showcase true American beauty with more than 200 of the New York theater scene’s sexiest chorus boys and girls on Sunday, June 23, at Roseland Ballroom.

As many of you may know, Broadway Bares benefits Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.

Head over to Gay.net for more postcards “from the edge.”

All images by Andrew Eccles.

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Trailer: “Test”

TEST, by writer/director Chris Mason Johnson, premieres at the Seattle International Film Festival on June 7, 2013.

From the film’s official website:

TEST is a poignant, powerful story of friendship and hope in a time of crisis, set in the San Francisco modern dance scene of 1985 in the early years of the AIDS epidemic: when headlines threatened a gay quarantine, when nobody knew for certain how the disease spread, when dancers were afraid to touch each other because they might get it from sweat…

The early history of the epidemic is big and complicated, and there are untold stories that frame the subject in a different light and need to be heard now as well.

TEST is one of these.

I was just beginning my career as a dancer in 1985, and I remember the fear and whispers at the time. A sad and dark period for a sad and dark issue.

For tickets to the premiere, click here.

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NY Times: No real AIDS cure, but steps forward

I posted recently about a possible “cure” for HIV/AIDS being researched in Denmark. Since that story came out, many in the medical research field have waved their hands in the air saying “wait, wait, wait! Not yet!”

The NY Times’s Donald G. McNeil Jr. explains the unusual cases in which HIV has seemingly been killed with drugs, and what can be learned from them.

Read the story here: http://nyti.ms/10q0jAG

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Denmark: Possible breakthrough for curing HIV “within months”

Researchers in Denmark believe they are on track to finding a possible cure to HIV:

Danish scientists are expecting results that will show that “finding a mass-distributable and affordable cure to HIV is possible.”

They are conducting clinical trials to test a “novel strategy” in which the HIV virus is stripped from human DNA and destroyed permanently by the immune system.

The scientists are currently conducting human trials using their treatment, in the hope of proving that it is effective. It has already been found to work in laboratory tests.

The technique involves releasing the HIV virus from “reservoirs” it forms in DNA cells, and bringing it to the surface of the cells. Once it comes to the surface, the body’s natural immune system can kill the virus through being boosted by a “vaccine.”

Read more at Business Insider
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Honey Boo Boo’s “Uncle Poodle” reveals HIV-positive status

Here Comes Honey Boo Boo cast member Lee Thompson, who is known on the show as Uncle Poodle and who gained praise last year for being out on the program, has revealed that he had his former boyfriend charged with HIV transmission after learning that he himself was HIV-positive last year.

Dino: Lee, when did you find out about your HIV status?

Lee: I was adamant about getting my HIV status checked on a regular basis. On March 16, 2012, I tested negative. Then, in May of 2012 my test results came back positive. I knew it had been my boyfriend who infected me. I later learned he had been HIV positive and was not taking medication and had not bothered to tell me about it. I was advised that I should press charges and, hesitantly, I did. It was the right thing to do.

Dino: What happened to your ex?

Lee: He is serving a 5-year sentence. I would have been cool with his HIV status if he had been honest. I don’t have an issue with the disease. I would have known how to protect myself.

Dino: What is your message to folks having unsafe sex?

Lee: They are damn fools! They are playing Russian roulette; they are playing with their lives and that of their sexual partners.

(source)