Paul Kidd, a 59-year-old activist and lawyer who lives north of the Australian city of Melbourne, said he was first diagnosed with HIV in 1991 but had probably already had it for several years.
Although he asked for a test in 1986, he said his doctor advised against it because “at that time there were no treatments and the political climate was very bad for people with HIV, with open calls for us to be quarantined, criminalised or otherwise mistreated”.
“My diagnosis was hard to accept but not really a surprise, as an ex-partner of mine had died of AIDS in 1988,” he said.
“Many people I knew and loved died.”
After his diagnosis, Kidd started on an antiretroviral drug called AZT, which he said “made me very sick” but which he credits with saving his life.
Now he takes just one daily pill with no side effects.
“One thing that hasn’t changed much is HIV stigma,” he said, particularly in some regions.
When she was born in Mexico in 1986, her mother required an emergency Caesarean section, contracting HIV during a blood transfusion.
Her mother then “unknowingly breastfed me and that’s how I acquired HIV”, said Granados, who now lives in Los Angeles.
It wasn’t until five years later, “when my dad started getting sick” that the family learned it had HIV, she said.
Her father died shortly after being diagnosed. Her mother was pregnant at the time but was advised not to breastfeed.
“So my sister, thankfully, is HIV-negative,” Granados said.
Despite getting cancer at the age of 10, Granados said she “has had a very healthy life”.
But she feels that people who have had HIV since birth are too often forgotten or ignored.
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“We’re an asterisk at best. For the most part, we are not represented in the history of long HIV,” she said.
Discriminated against
Joel Vermont, a 58-year-old living in the eastern suburbs of Paris, found out he had HIV in 1992.
“I was 27. It felt like being hit by a falling building,” he said.
When he started on AZT, the “abominable” side effects led to him losing nearly 30 kilograms (65 pounds).
Then the new three-drug regimen “didn’t work on me”.
“I switched to alcohol,” he said.
“My viral load exploded. I developed lung disease and early-onset cancer.
https://punchng.com/people-living-with-hiv-for-over-30-years-narrate-ordeals/
