25 Candles, 1 Fire

Twenty-five years have gone by since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported on what would one day become known as AIDS. Marking anniversaries aside, there’s no easy way to report on the breadth and complexity of its history—especially since the pandemic is history in the making and everyone has a chance to make a difference, make their dreams a reality. When it comes to the dawn of HIV/AIDS, solution did not follow problem; and today, there is no clear timeline of progress, of things getting better and better. Governmental support has been uneven at best, though what funding that does exist ends up having enough influence to jerk AIDS service organizations this way and that. Fundraising in the private sector needs to be kick-started again and again. Life-saving drugs have appeared, yet the majority of those living with HIV/AIDS worldwide cannot access them and those who can must often play the game of musical chairs when it comes to resistance and regimens.

It often seems as if nations, the courts, communities play with our time, and yet core approaches to clocks and calendars have survived from those early days. Time is precious. Small moments can make big changes, whether it’s the time it takes to raise a protest sign or drive across town to give a friend a much-needed hug. Get through today. Teach yourself to view time through a telescope but also a microscope—your life might very well be extended, but also, suddenly, contracted. Never forget what came before. Never forget those who are quickly becoming only specks in that behemoth of a number: Twenty-five million dead since 1981.
A&U asked some of its cover interview subjects to weigh in about who or what has given them hope over the past twenty-five years and about how far we have come and how far we have yet to go.                

How Far Have We Come? What Still Needs to Be Done?

Susan Sarandon
We have accepted the notion that being HIV-positive is not a death sentence and people living with AIDS are not victims—but can lead a happy, productive life. This is very big. But I’m afraid that right now we have been lulled into a sense of false security and are taking more chances in both heterosexual and homosexual encounters. People are having unprotected sex.

Kevin Bacon
Since 1981 we have more awareness in this country of the realities of AIDS and HIV. We no longer think of it as a “gay plague”; however, the insistence of the religious right that contraception is the devil’s work continues to disturb me. Having two teenagers myself, I know that open and honest discussions of sex and AIDS are the path. I’m saddened and disheartened by the spread of AIDS in other parts of the world. We have an uphill battle to educate people about the use of condoms, etc. It’s important that we remember that we are globally connected. The risk is that we turn our backs on the people of Africa and Asia because it’s “over there.” 

David Leavitt
Twenty-five years ago, when I was nineteen, I took it for granted that within a few years there would be a “cure”; that AIDS would be rendered historical, like polio. It’s sobering to look back and see how innocent I was then; how innocent we all were.

Mo'Nique
I think we have come an extremely long way with this disease and lots of advances have happened. I know we have much farther to go. I think socially we have not advanced that much—there are still so many misconceptions and myths concerning HIV/AIDS and people are dying from this disease unnecessarily every day. Socially and educationally we need to step it up.                        

Alan Cumming
We have come a long way in terms of the stigma attached to the disease. It is no longer spoken of in hushed tones, and great strides are being made both medically and in terms of the logistics of containing its spread across the globe. But I don’t know how far we can ever come when we have governments like the Bush administration that refuse to fund any programs of sex education aside from abstinence. Education is the key to all change, and especially sex education is the key to the containment and hopefully eventual cure of HIV and AIDS. Shame on America for allowing its government to pander to a powerful right-wing religious lobby at the expense of people’s lives.

Doris Roberts
It is shocking to realize that we are approaching the 25th anniversary of the discovery of AIDS. While it is gratifying to know there have been medical and pharmaceutical inroads that have made it possible for many people living with AIDS to lengthen and even cope effectively with this disease, it is discouraging to know that it remains with us with no foreseeable cure. I often wonder if our lifestyle of increased attention to technological growth—and its economic impact is so primary to this lifestyle—[has made us] place the welfare of mankind on the back burner, shocking and outrageous as it may be. There is so much pain in my heart as I think of the many colleagues and friends who were struck down, many in the prime of their lives, by the horror of this plague, but I congratulate A&U and its dedicated staff for maintaining awareness and pray that we will see an end long before another quarter of a century has passed.

CCH Pounder
Remember the great C, a word we dared only whisper? In the beginning they cut so many parts of the human body off in order to halt it. The chemicals were so harsh, you could die as easily taking them as you could the disease. Now remember that unspoken thing that some of our friends had? The blackened fingernails and disappearing flesh, boils and lesions? It seemed like they were fine for a year then they dwindled to nothing and then they were gone? Then cocktails, the right combination of drugs, the endless research, the No Show Ball and a thousand other different kinds of fundraisers. Remember the ones we thought would be goners but thank God they are still here, being responsible, diligent about their medication and getting on with life? Remember the GAY disease, which is now the fastest growing disease in the heterosexual community? Particularly in the black community. AIDS and the great C (cancer) look like they are on the same path. Twenty-five years is just a moment in the blip/blink of history, but now is the time to change the course. Keep fighting.

Who Has Given You Hope?

Keith Boykin
Phill Wilson has inspired me. For the thirteen years I’ve known him, he’s not only been living with AIDS but also fighting the epidemic in the black community as well. Phill’s had his ups and downs in his personal health and in the organizations he has started, but he has never given up the fight and never given up the faith that we can end the AIDS epidemic. When others have tried to ignore the problem or sweep it under the rug, Phill has always been there to raise the issue. He has been an inspiration and a hero in the struggle.      

Sandra Oh
Theater. How theater has talked about, mourned about, raged about this pandemic, is what has given me the most hope, the most relevant thought.

Margaret Cho
What has given me the most hope is the amazing efforts of people banding together and raising awareness about AIDS, the way that the gay community has unified to fight it—that it has brought politics into queer culture like nothing else before it, save Stonewall.

Carlos & Deborah Santana
Our involvement with Artists for a New South Africa (a nonprofit organization dedicated to combating the African AIDS pandemic and advancing democracy and equality in South Africa, as well as furthering civil rights and safeguarding voting rights in the U.S.) has given us hope that we, as a community of active, compassionate people, can end the AIDS pandemic. In 2003, we were fortunate to establish the Amandla AIDS Fund (AAF) to provide grants to effective South African organizations to combat AIDS and also develop innovative, collaborative programs.
The AAF advisory board is chaired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu and made up of leading South African HIV/AIDS experts and AIDS activists who help select effective South African organizations and programs to receive grants. In the past year AAF has allocated and granted over $1.25 million to pivotal programs that:
• Give free treatment and medical care to those living with HIV/AIDS;
• Provide comprehensive assistance to children orphaned by AIDS;
• Advocate and litigate for improved government and corporate HIV/AIDS programs and policies;
• Provide peer and grassroots education on AIDS treatment literacy and HIV/AIDS prevention; and
• Destigmatize the disease and empower people living with HIV/AIDS.

AAF targets recipient organizations and programs, where funds are most needed and will have significant impact. Priority is given to efforts which are:
• Addressing great need, yet are under-funded;
• Grassroots in nature and have a hard time accessing international support;
• Community projects where small amounts of funding can make a significant difference;
• Innovative, model programs which are replicable and can have far-reaching impact;
• Helping meet the urgent need to save lives, especially the lives of those whose work is critical to saving the lives of others; and
• Maximizing resources through inter-group collaboration.

We have hope that awareness and loving activism can continue to alert people about how to protect themselves, how to facilitate change in countries where the stigma of HIV/AIDS keeps them silent, and to educate everyone about this disease that has become known as AIDS. We work for the memories of Frank Barone and other dear friends who have lost their lives.

 
Special thanks to Dann Dulin, B. Andrew Plant, Lester Strong, and Chael Needle for their help in researching and writing this article.

June 2006