Peter H. Duesberg is a German-American molecular biologist and a professor of molecular and cell biology at the University of California, Berkeley. He is known for his early research into the genetic aspects of cancer. He is a proponent of AIDS denialism, the claim that HIV does not cause AIDS.
Safe sex is sexual activity using methods or contraceptive devices to reduce the risk of transmitting or acquiring sexually transmitted infections (STIs), especially HIV. "Safe sex" is also sometimes referred to as safer sex or protected sex to indicate that some safe sex practices do not eliminate STI risks. It is also sometimes used colloquially to describe methods aimed at preventing pregnancy that may or may not also lower STI risks.
HIV/AIDS denialism is the belief, despite conclusive evidence to the contrary, that the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) does not cause acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS). Some of its proponents reject the existence of HIV, while others accept that HIV exists but argue that it is a harmless passenger virus and not the cause of AIDS. Insofar as they acknowledge AIDS as a real disease, they attribute it to some combination of sexual behavior, recreational drugs, malnutrition, poor sanitation, haemophilia, or the effects of the medications used to treat HIV infection (antiretrovirals).
The GMHC is a New York City–based non-profit, volunteer-supported and community-based AIDS service organization whose mission statement is to "end the AIDS epidemic and uplift the lives of all affected." Founded in 1982, it is often billed as the "world's oldest AIDS service organization," as well as the "nation's oldest HIV/AIDS service organization."
MTV News: Unfiltered is an American television series created by Steven Rosenbaum which aired on MTV in the 1990s. The half-hour show features footage of real events provided by viewers, and later selected and edited by the show's producers. The videos show controversial events in the viewers' community that were not being covered by traditional news outlets.
People With AIDS (PWA) means "person with HIV/AIDS", also sometimes phrased as Person Living with AIDS. It is a term of self-empowerment, adopted by those with the virus in the early years of the pandemic, as an alternative to the passive implications of "AIDS patient". The phrase arose largely from the ACT UP activist community, however use of the term may or may not indicate that the person is associated with any particular political group.
AIDS is caused by a human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which originated in non-human primates in Central and West Africa. While various sub-groups of the virus acquired human infectivity at different times, the present pandemic had its origins in the emergence of one specific strain – HIV-1 subgroup M – in Léopoldville in the Belgian Congo in the 1920s.
LeRoy Whitfield was an African-American freelance journalist who chronicled his personal experience with HIV infection and AIDS. He was hailed by many as one of the nation's leading journalists reporting on AIDS in the African-American community.
Scott O'Hara was an American pornographic performer, author, poet, editor and publisher. He rose to prominence during the mid-1980s for his work in such gay adult films as Winner Takes All, Below The Belt and In Your Wildest Dreams. O'Hara wrote four books: SeXplorers: The Guide to Doing It on the Road, Do It Yourself Piston Polishing , Autopornography: A Memoir of Life in the Lust Lane, and Rarely Pure and Never Simple: Selected Essays of Scott O'Hara, and edited and published the quarterly men's sex journal Steam and the cultural magazine Wilde.
Paul Lekakis is an American model, actor and club music / Hi-NRG singer, who was discovered for his musical and dancing skills at an Italian nightclub while on assignment as a model.
Joseph Adolph Sonnabend was a South African physician, scientist and HIV/AIDS researcher, notable for pioneering community-based research, the propagation of safe sex to prevent infection, and an early multifactorial model of AIDS.
Stephen Gendin was an American AIDS activist in the late 1980s and the 1990s, whose advocacy is credited with having promoted changes in government policy that improved the lives of HIV positive people. He was involved with the ACT UP, ActUp/RI, Sex Panic!, the Community Prescription Service, POZ Magazine and the Radical Faeries. HIV positive himself, he dedicated the last fifteen years of his life to helping care for those also living with HIV/AIDS. He was a founder and the chief executive of the Community Prescription Service, an organization that distributes information designed to help people with HIV and AIDS as well as supplying medication via mail order.
Henry Joseph Nicols was an American HIV/AIDS activist who became the first American student to intentionally disclose his HIV infection to his community in March 1991.
Steve Schalchlin is an American songwriter, actor and musician. He is widely regarded as one of the first HIV/AIDS bloggers, beginning his in 1996 to keep family and friends updated on his failing health. When he responded well to a last-ditch effort in treatment by his doctor, he found out that his little "AIDS blog" had garnered a net following. A respected songwriter, Steve put his rebound into music that his partner, playwright Jim Brochu, turned into the critically acclaimed The Last Session.
POZ is a magazine that chronicles the lives of people affected by HIV/AIDS. Its website, POZ.com, has daily HIV/AIDS news, treatment information, forums, blogs, and personals.
Marvelyn Brown is an African-American author and AIDS activist. She is the founder of Marvelous Connections, an HIV/AIDS organization founded in 2006. She wrote the autobiography The Naked Truth: Young, Beautiful and (HIV) Positive, which tells her story as a young heterosexual woman living with HIV. She has delivered public speeches and made public appearances in the United States, Bermuda, Canada, Jamaica, Mexico, the Virgin Islands, South Africa, Tanzania, and Rwanda.
Peter Staley is an American political activist, known primarily for his work in HIV/AIDS activism. As an early and influential member of ACT UP, New York, he founded both the Treatment Action Group (TAG) and the educational website AIDSmeds.com. Staley is a primary figure in the Oscar-nominated documentary How to Survive a Plague.
Mark S. King is an American HIV/AIDS activist, blogger, writer, and actor. King tested positive for HIV in 1985 and became an HIV/AIDS activist soon after. In 2020, the Association of LGBTQ Journalists presented King with the Sarah Pettit Memorial Award for the LGBTQ Journalist of the Year. He is the creator of the video blog My Fabulous Disease, which won the 2020 GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Blog. Out magazine named King to its 2020 Out100 list of LGBTQ+ influencers.
Hector Xtravaganza was a member of the House of Xtravaganza and well-known figure in the NYC ballroom life, entertainer, fashion stylist, and public advocate for HIV/AIDS and LGBTQ+ organizations.
