David Duran

Finding the time each day for some self-reflection or meditation is really all we need and can be incredibly helpful. What I didn't realize is how difficult something so simple is to do.

When this video started making the rounds and popped up in my social feeds, I knew I had to watch it but wanted to be prepared, so I waited until the right moment, when I was alone, just in case I couldn't control my emotions.

I started the podcast by posing this question to the questioner: "When you have a hookup or one-night stand, do you ask about HIV status before engaging in sex?"

That fear has very little do to with my infection, precisely. The daily task of taking a pill before bed has become a mundane task I no longer think about. I’ve been undetectable for about 7 and a half of the eight years I’ve been living with HIV, and I’m healthier than ever.

Stigma is as much a part of HIV as ever. That’s the point made by A Day with HIV, POSITIVE AWARE’s antistigma campaign. Launched in 2010, A Day with HIV is a single 24-hour period in September during which everyone, regardless of HIV status, is encouraged to capture
a moment of their day with a picture and caption. The images and stories are shared on social media, using the hashtag #adaywithhiv, and featured on the campaign’s online gallery at adaywithhiv.com.

Ten different people called 911 after seeing me on the road that night. It turns out I had been driving way too slowly for being on the highway—like 30 miles per hour—and had been changing lanes without signaling, for hours. When the officer pulled me over, I was given a breathalyzer test on the spot, and asked to perform some basic field sobriety tests. And then I was put into the back of a police car.

I know straight people living with HIV are out there—and that HIV affects people of every race, age, sex, and gender identity. But they’re just not part of my community—and my experience made me wonder how their exclusion from the HIV community is a problem.

That was the text of one message I got earlier this week after early results from the RIVER HIV study were shared with major media publications.
I scrolled through my social media sites—which I quickly realized were saturated with links to the breaking story of an “HIV cure.” I could feel that familiar sinking feeling in my gut. Not again!

In honor of National Gay Men’s HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, David Duran shares tips and advice for gay men that test positive for HIV.

It’s a tiny island 90 miles off the coast of Florida, easily dismissed by many as a communist country with a depressed economy. Like many other places in the world, HIV remains a serious concern. But what some people don’t know is that Cuba has achieved a milestone in HIV prevention that has made the world stand up and take note.

. We live our lives paying bills, watering the lawns, maintaining our homes, but we also need to apply the same care to ourselves. If you are fortunate to be in a good place with your HIV, meaning that you are on meds, healthy and on track, take a few moments to make sure you stay that way by focusing on a mini-check list that can be reviewed every few months, weeks or days, depending on what you need, and make sure you are keeping on course.

Nu-Man is a teacher in South Los Angeles and the environment is similar to what her father endured growing up. "I work as a middle school teacher, and I have kids who are troubled and some already even have parole officers," she said. "I wanted to take on this challenge for myself to demonstrate to my kids that if you are willing to commit and take the steps, you can do anything you put your mind to." And Nu-Man did just that by filming her experience and showing her kids what she had accomplished.

"I didn't know what [PEP] was, and I think it was the first I had heard of it, so the next day I tried to ignore it and went back and forth with myself and just couldn't let it go," he said. "I left early from work that day and took a cab to the clinic, and as I arrived, they were shutting the door and locking it."

According to Joshua G. Rosenberger, Ph.D., M.P.H, "available data shows that HIV epidemics among gay men and other MSM [men who have sex with men] have expanded in most low-, middle- and upper-income demographics." Rosenberger said that nearly three-quarters of gay men have a Facebook profile, and gay men are twice as likely as heterosexual counterparts to have a Twitter account. "Smartphone apps and web-based social networks are quickly replacing and supplementing traditional physical venues," he said.

After years of research and testing, a method for monitoring medication adherence in real-time has proven effective in low-resource settings, attendees heard at the AIDS 2016 workshop, "Measuring Antiretroviral Therapy Adherence: Using Real-Time Adherence Monitoring in Research and Practice." Electronic monitoring devices are now being used in research studies to assess when antiretrovirals are taken. According to doctors who have participated in such studies, this type of monitoring is one of the more objective adherence measures.