What the Rubberman Wrote – October 2023

AIDs quilt panel — Change The Pattern is displaying Quilt panels in communities throughout the South, where AIDS disproportionately impacts people of color.

by Michael Harney –

If you have been a reader of The Urban News over the years, particularly pre-Covid, you may recall I frequently reported on conferences I was lucky enough to attend.

I got lucky again in September when I attended the 25th Annual Positive Living Conference in Ft. Walton Beach, Florida. The event was organized by OASIS, (Okaloosa AIDS Support and Informational Services), the agency similar to WNCAP (Western NC AIDS Project) in our region.

Nearly 500 people attended, the majority of whom are thriving with a controlled and suppressed HIV through adherently taking life-sustaining antiretroviral medication, and bringing their viral loads to undetectable levels, making it untransmittable to their sexual partners (U=U). We were there for a few days of information gathering, socializing, support, and remembrance.

I was especially struck by an early-morning session facilitated by Alicia Diggs, Ph.D.(c), MPH, UNC-Chapel Hill Center for AIDS, and Cecilia Dennis, co-chair of Women of Color Rise Up. Both women are involved in other modes of advocacy and education holding national status and influence.

What stood out most was their personal experiences participating in clinical research on women’s health, something they both stressed has been discriminatory against women for way too long, leaving health issues unaddressed among women often due to random excuses by researchers—most of whom have been men—forcing women into substandard care.

making a quilt — Quilt panels honor and celebrate the lives of those lost to HIV/AIDS.

What they advocated, with emphasis on women of color, was empowering women to learn more about studies in which they may find interest, signing up to participate, and for compensation where available—perhaps an ethical issue for further discussion.

Here are a few websites to explore:

What also stood out to me was the Heart Circle and new National AIDS Memorial Quilt panels that were inducted into the largest national piece of folk-art in the world.

Change The Pattern is the new theme for the Quilt, in an effort to reduce the stigma and share the names of Black and Brown people who died of AIDS over the years, but whose names never got included in this important memorial. For more information, please visit www.changethepattern.org and www.aidsmemorial.org/quilt.

When those who had lost somebody in the past 12 months were asked to stand around a newly inducted panel, only one white person, a man, came forth among the 25-30 people of color who stepped up. It was telling, and further indicated to me the need to get the word out that HIV is not gone; it can be prevented by so many means including PrEP (www.cdc.gov/hiv/risk/prep/index.html); and it is treatable more effectively than ever.

Please take time this season as we head toward World AIDS Day on December 1, 2023, to update your knowledge about HIV, and consider making a Quilt panel in memory of a loved one you may have lost in the 42 years of this never-ending epidemic called HIV/AIDS.