In the Life: Ep. 1903, "Creating Solutions"

coming up on in the life the challenges of finding an effective HIV vaccine the virus is a moving target genetically and biochemically a conversation with kenneth cole and Regan Hoffman as long as I make HIV something that happens to other people I don't have to worry about it today the power of stigma is astounding and an update on the success of the online series HIV is still a big deal in the life is funded in part by the H man hammering and foundations arcus foundation the estate of Richard W weinland autohaus Charitable Trust number two Broadway cares/equity fights aids and by the annual support of in the life members like you since the first causes of AIDS were identified in 1981 over 20 million people have died from the disease and an estimated 14,000 people are infected each day tonight on in the life documenting the people and the issues shaping the gay experience HIV how close are we defining a vaccine can we de-stinkify and how successful our prevention efforts throughout history no viral disease has been cured without a vaccine and hiv/aids is no exception though we have the tools for living with HIV education behavior change and treatment the development of an HIV vaccine remains the only hope for eradicating the virus finding this magic bullet however has proven to be harder than anyone ever imagined the probable cause of AIDS has been found may we also believe that the new process will enable us to develop a vaccine to prevent aids in the future we hope to have such a vaccine ready for testing in approximately two years the highest high was when we discovered the virus and said now we have something to work with it was assumed that this virus would succumb to our tools until we found out how bloody complicated HIV is the virus is just an absolute catastrophe when it comes to making a vaccine the virus is a moving target genetically and biochemically this virus has the ability to change its genetic makeup in a way that's perhaps unprecedented in terms of any virus that we've ever encountered understanding the basic science of HIV is not the only challenge in a lot of diseases you look for models in animals to predict things that might happen in humans it's a quickest way to develop a product unfortunately with HIV there isn't a good model no animal gets HIV the way we do at the end of the day the only animal that can really tell us if a vaccine works is the human animal and that means you've got to run very expensive trials as the number of hiv-infected escalated to pandemic proportions treatment presented the first major breakthrough and antiretrovirals took center stage if there is one glowing overwhelming success story in HIV research is the development of highly highly effective therapies even with antiretroviral therapy there is an urgent need for a vaccine we're never going to control the worldwide epidemic with any retroviral therapy it's just not gonna happen given where the epidemic is and given how it spreads it won't work we need a vaccine for years activists have demanded treatments but these voices have been noticeably absent when demanding a vaccine when we look back on 28 years of activism around HIV and AIDS it was driven by people who were dying now with prevention we don't see that who needs an AIDS vaccine everybody does but everybody's not a constituency in the way that people living with any disease are for their disease prevention relies on all of us to figure out that preventive health and AIDS vaccines can alter the course of the world in public health and that's easy to say hard to create movements around if your only sense of satisfaction would come for getting a vaccine that worked it would be very depressing it's very hard it requires a perpetual sense of optimism and a ver special sense of hope a major setback came in 2007 when the results of a trial conducted by Merck produced a shocking result not only did the vaccine fail but it may have actually increased HIV susceptibility in trial participants it was a result that truly came out of left field the idea that the actual administration of the vaccine could put somebody at increased risk for infection was devastating many of us were really grappling with that question with is it is it possible that the system is rigged in a way that we can't succeed that was a reality check for this field mired in controversy mired in competitiveness that said you know what we've got to do this in a different way because the way we're doing it now is not getting us where we need to be scientists decided to return to basic research in an attempt to understand this formidable enemy I think it's certainly has a very strong step in the right direction going back to basics and try and identify things that have a scientific basis to make you believe it might work as scientists went back to the drawing board a trial launched in Thailand in 2003 combined two vaccines one to prime the immune system and another to boost it 16,400 thai men and women are in this trial so it's a huge undertaking and there were a number of scientists in 2003 and for who said this child should not take place because it can't possibly work this is a stupid idea we'll have better vaccines in the future this trial will be recognized as a testament to Thailand's ability to successfully act when the results were released on sep tember 24 2009 route to the research community was stunned by the findings after 20 years there is finally hope of finding an effective AIDS vaccine a new vaccine has cut the risk of becoming infected with HIV by more than thirty one percent and have brought us one step closer to an HIV vaccine we can go in and look at what happened in the people who were protected how are they protected and what are the immune responses that are the signatures of that protection and then we can begin to incorporate those signatures into our planning earlier that same month the International AIDS vaccine initiative released a report that scientists set discovered two potent neutralizing antibodies that are proven to be effective in disarming multiple strains of the virus for the first time in a decade we've got new targets we've got new ways to look at the virus and advancing approaches to address the virus we can be much more directed and focused in terms of how to proceed with vaccine development even though this news is cause for celebration scientists know all too well to view these results with caution I've been in the field too long to jump up and down over anything right is this a vaccine no can we protect people with it no I do know with certainty that this is not the end of the road even if we get an HIV vaccine I don't see it being a free-standing preventive measure think it's going to be part of a broader comprehensive strategy we're still going to have to deal with all of the educational issues and we're still going to have to deal with many of the social and economic consequences of the disease yes we need a vaccine but a stigma doesn't stop with the vaccine criminalization of people's behavior doesn't stop with a vaccine so yes we need all of these new prevention tools including especially an AIDS vaccine but we have to remember that we need to be addressing the root causes of this epidemic which go far beyond basic science despite challenges these recent developments have brought renewed energy and hope to many scientists working to find an effective vaccine it's as if you were driving one in a country road you know at night with your headlights off and suddenly somebody gave you a head light and you can shine lights down the road it really makes the way forward a lot easier that's what he's been going every day is we have to try and even if it's not in my lifetime I know my contribution to the effort isn't zero I desperately want to see one in my lifetime I don't know that I will I know that we will be closer to having better vaccines and better vaccines in clinical trials where we have one in my lifetime it all depends on how long I live you people's proverbial shoes kenneth cole that one fashion designer chairman of the board of the foundation for aids research amfar and a social marketing pioneer since the beginning of the AIDS epidemic discusses the stigma surrounding HIV with Regan Hoffman editor-in-chief of poz magazine and the author of I have something to tell you a memoir which chronicles her life upon discovering she was HIV positive it's been four years almost since I told the world that I was living with HIV and i think that the stigma around HIV is something that a lot of people can relate to because a lot of people are dealing with something themselves even if it's not HIV and people tell me the most extraordinary things i don't know whether that's because they feel like if i can say HIV they can say anything or whether they're trying to commiserate and make me feel better or or sort of in this very compassionate quid pro quo have me know something about them since I've shared my secret with them it's amazing people today the power of stigma is astounding today in this day and age 25 years later into the virus and people think well we've gotten beyond that but your wife's example is in fact the case that we haven't but there are certain courageous individuals who have enabled us to come pretty far but we are so far from beyond that it's amazing you know people say to me stigma is no longer a problem and I think that people know how you get HIV and how you don't you know you can hug someone and kiss someone and drink out of their soda maybe but it's almost like we've become politically correct about it and people know that they should say that they're not afraid of HIV or that it's okay that someone's positive but deep inside I think people have a have still this big aversion to it as long as I make HIV something that happens to other people I don't have to worry about it as long as it's somebody else's disease I can just you know not have to change my behavior in the bedroom I don't have to embarrass me myself by going to buy condoms in the drugstore I think that even the stigma pervades into the medical community I was in the hospital a year ago for a staph infection and I requested some additional towels and paper and the nurse stood at my doorway and threw them over my head into my room she was afraid to come into my room and people say to me oh the stigma is better you know stigmas killing people it's absolutely killing people it's preventing people from getting tested it's preventing people from going to the doctor and from telling their families and you know you've done so much um since the very beginning of your career to fight stigma on a lot of issues including HIV AIDS so it's interesting because in 1985 did our first national ad campaign talking about the fact that nobody was talking about HIV in effect it was about stigma what was the line again it was for the future of our children and we had beautiful woman and we had children who nobody in effect felt offended by and and then years later we did a campaign we all have AIDS if anyone's in fact essentially the message was Ernie has in fact the world affected and we're all living with the virus some of us medically some of us socially just before the campaign launched it was we all have AIDS individual members who were in the campaign who were photographed next to each other such as Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu and Elton John and Ann Elizabeth tell people very iconic individuals who have given so much of their identity and their resources over the years to talk about the virus we asked reached out to several of these people and we asked if they would agree several days in advance of the campaign to wear a shirt be seen publicly with the message I have AIDS nobody wanted to do it it's amazing so they petrified and these were advocates these are people who have committed so many of their public their persona to this message they didn't want to go first they didn't want the tabloids to get ahold of that message so here we are and me less so than you you a bigger person than I still to this day have made compromises because of the power and the devastation of stigma which is why I asked you to be cover and you did and it's so powerful when people who are affected come together with people who are infected and you know blur those lines and and take the stigma away you know I think the the strangest thing for me when I was asked to come to pause magazine was I felt like I really wasn't the face of HIV and I looked at the numbers and I thought okay you know am i some fringe statistic what right do I have to be talking about HIV as if I'm some representative you know some emissary from the the community and since been at the magazine and um and just you know daily on the website which I have to spell because everyone thinks when I say that I work for pause they think that I work for a magazine about cats and dogs oh it's poz and it means you know HIV positive and positive and mindset and I see all these people and I realized that they're just it's everybody you know the disease has no clue it doesn't discriminate it doesn't know whether you're gay or straight or bisexual or black or white or young or old or it has no clue it's a biological agent I found it I would love to know what you think is it possible to be stigmatized HIV well it takes people like Regan and it takes people to tell their story and it takes whether I have something to tell you what is this is Regan hoffman's new book and it's her story it's regan talking about how difficult it was for her coming to terms with the fact that she had the virus and then coming to terms with addressing it publicly so and it's the courage of that you had in doing what you did and others to that make it easier for the people to say well they're pretty normal and in fact it could happen to anybody you know you call me brave what you do is so brave because on top of using your kenneth kool ad campaigns to you know raise awareness about hiv/aids you also the chairman of the board of this very powerful organization dedicated to research for AIDS so how did that come to pass I did my aides campaign in at 285 and what we did was felt bigger than what it was in the ordinary course and it wasn't we were saying in effect it wasn't what you stood for was maybe more important than what you stood in then then to be aware was maybe more important what you wear and that I think it culturally changed the nature of our business it changed me personally in a profound way and I was asked to join the board of am for an 87 and then they asked me to step up be the vice chairman then chairman for years ago and what fr does is really important and stigma is very powerful but the end of the day cure will income from research right that's what effort does have you always been a rule breaker how do you think about this in your head I mean you're breaking the rules to do good so but I've always believed that usually the best solution is the most creative one we could creatively find a way to approach this this crises without a sense of boundaries and do whatever one thinks they can do regardless of what they think they should do that we can continue at amfar to make extraordinary progress any regrets would you've done it differently which have come out sooner which I have written the book earlier which is if I knew I was gonna be sitting here today with you know if I think I suffered a lot longer than I needed to and I think that that's why I wanted to write the book because I know there are a lot of people out there suffering and isolated and they can go to pause calm and they can connect with the community and we have 85,000 people dating online on pause calm and they can do it privately they can do it openly in the forums the world is there for them and there's a humongous community of people with HIV and people affected by it who will support them and no one thank God and this age of technology has to be really isolated I think that's my only regret that I didn't have didn't find the courage sooner what's next what's next I'm gonna write a book about my dating life no um no I'm not sure it like you I'm just I'm gonna work until I die to try to solve the sucker you know I believe that it's possible to D stigmatize HIV you know I guess what's next is is just keepin on until we until we resolve it a year after we featured HIV is still a big deal a series of online HIV prevention films produced by the Public Health Solutions and NYU we take a fresh look at the success of this series thanks to a partnership with manhunt and online dating and social networking site for gay men the series has become an internationally effective intervention tool last year when I was here to talk to you about the project we had only recently launched our website HIV is still a big deal and a lot has happened since then all three of our videos are now online and also on YouTube and we've had over a hundred thousand views in the past year partnerships between online companies and HIV researchers are absolutely critical for this work to be good manhunt net is one of the most popular websites in the world for men looking to meet other men on December first we sent a broadcast email out to all of our english-speaking members alerting them of the HIV big deal videos of those million members or so about 220,000 opened the email and went on to look at the videos and the response was was quite great I became HIV positive three years ago and it changed my life I'm very impressed to see you take a proactive approach to highlighting HIV this was the first film that I saw an HIV positive person actually defending themselves and not being made out to be a villain i've recently gotten tested for the first time and it was a big deal now that I've seen these videos i know i have a responsibility to take care of my health one of the challenges in doing HIV prevention research is you've got to be developing programs that people are interested in HIV is a big deal really gets people to think oh it's a realistic portrayal without buying into stereotypes or without overdramatizing Josh what is going on mom I'm fine I'm just getting tested to make sure that I'm all right but I'm sure that I'm not positive as it walks that line between being entertaining and interesting but also really having a very strong and clear message many people have said to me are you sure it's okay to be working with a major hook-up site like manhunt and it does it does seem kind of odd but you might as well go where the men are they offered us a prime piece of real estate on the site and we actually recruited a thousand men to participate in our evaluation and the first evaluation that we did and this is this is very unusual there's no denying that manhunt plays a really important role in gay men's sexual health and sexual culture right now and to deny that I think does a real disservice to people who are doing HIV prevention we want members to go to our site and meet other other individuals and and have a good time and we want them we want them healthy when they moved into South America and Mexico they were very interested in translating the videos into Spanish because they're already demonstrated to be effective you know damn well you have more than a few drinks we had our video editor place the Spanish and Portuguese subtitles on to the actual two videos and we put that up a couple months ago and it's been viewed by about 20,000 men most of the HIV prevention programs that are online are in English only we've had hits from I think it's a hundred and fifty two countries so that the word gets out there I mean when something is online there there are no geographic boundaries and we finally have just published the evaluation of the impact of the first video on changes in behavior and found that after men watch the video three months later they were about three times more likely to disclose their HIV status to their partners about 120 of them were tested after watching the video and 17 of them fourteen percent found out that they were positive for a program of nine minutes in length to have that type of effect I think is really important and really suggests that more efforts should be put into video based programming for HIV prevention now after 25 years of HIV just talking about condoms isn't enough we need to take it to the next level so I wish that really everybody who is committed to taking care of HIV in our community was more accepting of these new and creative approaches because I think they're really the future of HIV prevention thank you for watching in the life to learn more about the issues in tonight's stories and how they affect you visit our website at in the life TV org you can also watch extended interviews sign up for monthly airdate alerts and download past episodes 24-7 in the life is funded in part by the H fan a meringue and foundation arcus foundation the estate of richard w weinland autohaus Charitable Trust number two Broadway cares/equity fights aids and by the annual support of in the life members like you you you