A recent study
confirms that fear of HIV continues to trump scientific knowledge of the virus.
According to a
recent study in the Journal of the International AIDS Society, a disturbingly
high amount of HIV-negative gay men doubt the veracity of
the statement “Undetectable
= Untransmittable (U=U).” If you haven’t heard that motto before, it’s
pretty simple. People living with HIV who are on medication and whose
viral loads have reached undetectable status cannot transmit the virus to their
sexual partners. The motto arose after the PARTNER study showed
in 2016 that, among over 1,100 mixed-status couples who had condom-less sex, not one HIV-negative partner acquired HIV from their
HIV-positive partner.
On a purely
human level, the phenomena behind the data is that HIV-negative men refuse
to see HIV-positive people as anything other than a virus floating in their
blood. When a microscopic virus eclipses someone’s personhood, then something’s
gone awry.
As a
fellow HIV-negative man, I understand the myriad reasons that you
might not yet believe that undetectable = untransmittable. It’s not actually
about learning something new, but unlearning lifelong messages that just being
gay, and loving other men, would most likely lead to acquiring HIV. And
much of that public health messaging often sold HIV-positive gay men up
the river.
Aside from
public health messaging, so much of gay male culture revolves around the virus
as a shared history. Movies and plays about the queer experience often portray
the AIDS epidemic to differing effect. While it can serve as a way to unite the
community by exploring our shared history, it can also create trauma. And, of
course, it’s imperative to note that every HIV-negative.
Though it’s
easy to see the root of this long-held stigma, that doesn’t excuse its
survival. In the era of U=U, is believing that
HIV-positive people with an undetectable viral load can pass the virus is akin
to denying climate change?
Yes, as
queer men, we have trauma around HIV and that trauma needs to be
respected. But, for those HIV-negative men who decide their
trauma is more important than an HIV-positive person’s personhood, it’s
important that you acknowledge that the problem is your stigma, not a
person’s virus.
Well, we apparently have people who have no idea what AIDS was about. Chaplik - a republican in Arizona? Or Texas? He just convinced his constituents to ban mask mandates because, according to him, we had AIDS and nobody was forced to wear a mask, so they are not needed now???? Stupidity. That's the number one killer in this country, dear. Stupidity!!!
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