HIV: The Morning After copertina

HIV: The Morning After

HIV: The Morning After

Di: Dan Hall
Ascolta gratuitamente

An oral history and public-education audio archive documenting the lived experience of people living with HIV in the UK. The series captures testimony at a moment when institutional memory, peer support, and long-term survivor narratives are being eroded, despite medical progress. Led by Emmy award-winning documentary producer Dan Hall, the project is building a long-form archive of recorded testimonies for public, community, and educational use. This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Podtrac - https://analytics.podtrac.com/privacy-policy-gdrpCopyright 2026 Dan Hall Igiene e vita sana Scienze sociali
Episodi
  • Hamish Noah: Turbulence, Trauma, Turning Points

    Hamish Noah: Turbulence, Trauma, Turning Points
    Aug 13 2026
    A man who survived a hijacked plane at 11, spent years numbing himself with drugs and chemsex, was diagnosed with HIV on a comedown in January 2020, and found clarity four years later on a single dose of LSD taken to treat a pain condition.SummaryHamish Noah was ten days old when he left England for the Philippines. By six, he'd lived in five countries. By nine, he was in Malawi, sobbing in a supermarket in Blantyre because he couldn't understand why children outside had no food while his family filled a trolley. By 11, he was visiting an HIV project in one of Africa's largest informal settlements, surrounded by children living with the virus - with no idea how much that scene would come to define his adult life.On 29 December 2000, aged 11, Hamish was on British Airways flight 2069 from London to Nairobi when a man with severe mental illness entered the cockpit and tried to crash the 747. The plane dived towards the ground and nearly flipped. The co-pilot pulled off what became known as a miracle manoeuvre. Four hundred people survived. Hamish was offered therapy. He didn't really understand what it was. What he did understand, somewhere below the surface, was that he had been about to die - and that changed the way he moved through the world.By 13, he was smoking weed daily and shoplifting to fund it. By his late twenties, he was deep into chemsex, losing one or two nights of sleep a week, and running on a mantra left over from the hijacking: it's not that bad. On New Year's Eve 2019, he had a bender. On 6 January 2020, he went to a clinic. On the 8th, the phone call came. He was standing in his bedroom. Time stopped.For four years, he told almost nobody. He experienced stigma from people close to him - rooted, he says, in cultural conditioning from the conservative African side of his family. He hadn't yet accepted himself as bisexual. He was withdrawing from drugs, starting HIV treatment on four pills a day, and going through it all in near-silence. Then, in early 2024, during a bout of cluster headaches - a condition so painful it's nicknamed the suicide headache - he took LSD for medicinal purposes. Alone in his living room, he had an epiphany of total clarity: of course he was going to share his story. He wrote 90% of his public disclosure post that day. He hasn't touched LSD since.Today Hamish works as a recovery coach and HIV advocate. The DJ decks are on pause. The music, he says, will rejoin the party at some point.Key Moments[01:03] Born in Cambridge, raised everywhere - the Philippines, Singapore, England, Malawi, and a childhood shaped by constant movement and a father in aviation[03:22] British Airways flight 2069 - a hijacking at 35,000 feet on 29 December 2000, a 747 that nearly flipped, a miracle manoeuvre, and an 11-year-old whose mantra became "it's not that bad"[07:36] Vinyl at 13, weed at 13, daily by 14 - the beginning of numbing, and why Hamish sees no point in regret[10:36] When numbing stops being fun - recognising early that the drugs weren't for enjoyment, and the argument that sometimes numbing is better than the alternative[13:28] Sex as a holiday from your life - chemsex, connection, and the complication of genuinely bonding with someone while high[16:18] New Year's Eve 2019 - a bender, a clinic visit on the 6th of January, and the phone call on the 8th that stopped time[19:15] The Terrence Higgins Trust helpline - a lifeline in the early weeks, and the peer supporter Hamish is still in touch with today[20:14] Four years of near-silence - stigma from people close to him, a bisexuality he hadn't yet accepted, and the weight of cultural conditioning from a conservative background[24:15] Acute trauma and complex trauma - the difference between a single event and the slow accumulation of being silenced, and why the body stores what the mind tries to forget[26:05] Racism, a cricket bat, and intergenerational trauma - watching his Black African mother be racially abused, and the understanding that trauma is passed down through generations[34:48] Cluster headaches, LSD, and the epiphany - a pain condition so severe it's nicknamed the suicide headache, psychedelics taken for medicinal purposes, and the moment of total clarity in a living room that led to public disclosure[40:30] The pushback and the net benefit - stigma from extended family, judgey messages, and the decision that silence helps nobody[45:31] Malawi, gratitude, and the supermarket in Blantyre - a nine-year-old in tears, a visit to an HIV project in a Kenyan slum at 11, and the sense of duty that connects everythingDedicationHamish remembers Hydeia Broadbent, a young American woman born with HIV who appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show as a child and spoke about the virus with extraordinary eloquence. She died recently. Hamish does not know anyone personally who has died of AIDS-related illness, and is grateful for the era in which he was diagnosed.About Hamish NoahHamish Noah was born in Cambridge and grew up across ...
    Mostra di più Mostra meno
    55 min
  • Winnie Sseruma: Silence, Scars, Solidarity

    Winnie Sseruma: Silence, Scars, Solidarity
    Aug 6 2026
    A Ugandan-born woman diagnosed with HIV in 1988 who went back to Africa to die, arrived in the UK with a CD4 count of one, and built a career spanning 20 countries in African health policy.SummaryWinnie Sseruma left Uganda on a scholarship to study sociology in Kansas in 1981. The students there asked her if she lived in a tree. By 1988, she was 27, back in the United States, and applying for an internship that required an HIV test. It came back positive. She told her partner, who blamed her, ghosted her, then called back weeks later to say his own test was negative. After that, Winnie stopped telling anyone. She sat through conversations where friends described how they'd treat an HIV-positive person - never eat in their house, never share a bathroom, never be friends - and said nothing.She was offered AZT, which she couldn't afford. The side effects turned her skin from shiny black to ashy. Between 1990 and 1993, her brother, her mother, and her father all died while she was trapped in the US. In 1994, she packed six months' worth of medication and flew to Uganda to die. When the pills ran out, she got TB, pneumonia, and diarrhoea. She nearly died, but a short trip to the UK saved her. At Newham General Hospital, her CD4 count was one.A Ugandan woman she'd met only briefly invited her to a place to socialise. It was a support group for people living with HIV. Winnie could see herself in the women there. She went from preparing to die to learning how treatment works - and it was, in her word, invigorating. She co-founded the African HIV Policy Network, chaired it from Parliament, co-wrote Our Stories Told by Us, and now monitors health programmes across 20 African countries for the Stephen Lewis Foundation.Key Moments[02:05] Kansas, 1981 - a scholarship, a culture shock, and students who thought Ugandans lived in trees[07:05] The positive result - an internship test in 1988, a death sentence at 27, and a life flashing before her eyes[08:58] Telling a partner - blame, rejection, being ghosted, and the lesson that disclosure was not safe[11:49] Conversations she sat through - friends describing how they'd never eat in the house of someone with HIV, while Winnie stayed silent beside them[12:37] AZT and its costs - paying for medication with no insurance, vomiting the pills back up, and a treatment that changed her skin colour[17:02] Four deaths in four years - a brother in 1991, a mother in 1990, a father in 1993, all from Uganda while Winnie couldn't leave the US[17:52] Going back to Uganda to die - six months of medication, then TB, pneumonia, and a CD4 count of one at Newham General Hospital[21:33] The Ugandan woman and the support group - an invitation framed as socialising, a room full of women telling their stories, and the moment Winnie stopped being alone[26:07] The African HIV Policy Network and Fed Up - supporting African women with HIV to engage with policy, and fighting a UK Department of Health that treated an entire continent as one community[39:54] Our Stories Told by Us - a book co-written with four friends to change the narrative about African communities and the UK HIV response[42:41] Remembering her brother - a gentle giant who died of HIV-related TB in 1991 at 27, the same age Winnie was when she was diagnosedDedicationWinnie remembers her brother, who died of HIV-related TB in 1991 at the age of 27 - the same age she was at diagnosis. She wants him to know he was loved.About Winnie SserumaWinnie Sseruma was born in Sheffield and raised in Uganda. She was diagnosed with HIV in 1988 in the United States. She co-founded the African HIV Policy Network, chaired it from Parliament, and co-wrote Our Stories Told by Us: Celebrating the African Contribution to the UK HIV Response. She works across 20 African countries monitoring health programmes for the Stephen Lewis Foundation.ResourcesBuy Our Stories Told By Us, the bookStephen Lewis FoundationNational AIDS TrustTerrence Higgins TrustPositively UKThe 2025–2030 UK HIV Action PlanIf you have been affected by the themes in this episode, support is available at tht.org.uk.This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Podtrac - https://analytics.podtrac.com/privacy-policy-gdrp
    Mostra di più Mostra meno
    48 min
  • SONG: Rethink Rebuild Rise (Rio Calling)

    SONG: Rethink Rebuild Rise (Rio Calling)
    Aug 2 2026
    Available now on Spotify and Apple Music.

    Apple Music / Spotify

    Profits from sales will go towards plugging the remaining £1k costs incurred in producing the #AIDS2026 specials, 'Rio Calling'.

    'Rio Calling' crowd-funder: https://hiv-the-morning-after.captivate.fm/rethinkrebuildrise

    LYRICS:[Verse 1]

    They came to Rio, sun and rain,

    the world arrived to talk again,

    with rights and science, hand in hand,

    and here Brazil, she took a stand.

    [Pre-Chorus]

    The funding's running dry,

    and pharma's flying high,

    they warned us: cuts bring death

    we answer with one breath:

    [Chorus]

    So rethink, rebuild and rise,

    raise the science to the skies,

    no access, that's no justice

    so open up your eyes.

    [Verse 2]

    They spoke of jabs beyond the pill,

    long-acting shots to fit the bill,

    so bNAbs — is it hope or hype?

    The cure's still climbing up the pipe.

    [Pre-Chorus]

    The funding's running dry,

    and pharma's flying high,

    they warned us: cuts bring death

    we answer with one breath:

    [Chorus]

    So rethink, rebuild and rise,

    raise the science to the skies,

    no access, that's no justice

    so open up your eyes.

    [Toast / Bridge]

    Now — U equals U, so hear me shout:

    undetectable, don't stress out!

    PrEP inna motion, long-acting too,

    communities leading - that's nothing new!

    Criminalised, but still we rise,

    harm reduction, open your eyes!

    From testing to treatment we hold the line

    rethink, rebuild, one more time!

    [Verse 3]

    We're ageing now, we're living long,

    they wrote a session, wrote this song,

    "live long, live strong," the doctors said,

    now mind your liver, heart and head.

    [Chorus]

    So rethink, rebuild and rise,

    raise the science to the skies,

    no access, that's no justice

    so open up your eyes.



    This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

    Podtrac - https://analytics.podtrac.com/privacy-policy-gdrp
    Mostra di più Mostra meno
    4 min
adbl_web_anon_alc_button_suppression_t1
Ancora nessuna recensione