Messaging, not medicine

The most effective way to slow or stop the spread of HIV or AIDS in the Philippines is through messaging, not medicine.

For many years people died from various “causes of death” until a representative sample of homosexuals died in San Francisco, California. Science and medicine succeeded in telling the world what the “disease” was, calling it AIDS or HIV and that it was a “terminal condition.” They sorted out who got it and how people got it. They even got it wrong by labeling it as a “homosexual disease.” But history shows us that it was through the media and public figures who gave out correct, relevant and responsible messaging, that the world began to understand what AIDS / HIV was and was not.

To date there is no real cure to prevent or stop AIDS or HIV. What helped the battle against the spread of AIDS was correct messaging. Celebrities, the media and the victims all stepped up and stepped out to tell the world that AIDS was real, painful, difficult and it kills ALL of its victims from all walks of life, gender, religion or color.

Unfortunately the messaging got changed and everybody started focusing on a treatment, a cocktail of medicines, and a basketball celebrity who beat the odds. People focused on kids beating the odds of HIV transferring from mother to child. The messaging shifted from warnings to hallelujahs and before you know it, the guards were down and the lifestyle of careless sex recycled into vogue.

In the Philippines, we now have the unsavory reputation of being one of the few if not the only country where AIDS and HIV has increased and gotten out of control. That used to be applicable to disaster stricken, impoverished countries in Africa, but now it’s our public health threat and reality. Sadly the best effort that the DOH can come up with is to recycle old ideas or solutions that never got off the ground and deemed inappropriate and ineffective. They want to give out condoms in schools!

Giving out condoms is equivalent to aiding and abetting someone to carry on with his or her high risk sexual activity instead of being strategic and tactical in a battle that is only determined via statistics. The DOH knows who are getting sick: age 15 to 40, mostly males through same sex intercourse. The DOH knows the risk, resurgence of AIDS crossing over among heterosexual couples. The DOH also has a history of successful campaigns that were achieved through strategic media based campaigns that were direct to the point, not politically correct, and focused on ultimate consequences leading to death or serious injury.

Then Secretary Juan Flavier considered as the most popular DOH Secretary used media on every occasion to educate, intimidate and even scare people to make them stop smoking, stop using fireworks and to opt for a healthy lifestyle. His anti-fireworks campaign was so graphic both in print and TV that it scared kids and parents. His YOSI KADIRI campaign made smokers socially unattractive. As far as public awareness and reaction is concerned, Flavier had the right approach and he got our attention. In fact we were all so impressed we voted him to the Senate.

Lighting a stick of cigarette, lighting a huge firecracker, or engaging in high-risk sex generally involves a careless decision where people don’t think it can harm them. But once they are bombarded with the right messaging, when their heroes or “idols” show and tell them what real consequences or risk they are making, people do listen and the statistics bare that out.  I have lost three friends to AIDS. They all died sorry, sad, and not a sight to behold. They all regretted their bad choices and they were horrified realizing how many other people they may have infected with HIV.

What they had in common was that they were ignorant of what AIDS really was. They knew the disease but not the real life consequences. They never met or saw a “walking dead.” They never spoke to as many as I have. AIDS was a topic, a story and generally toned down almost sprinkled with sugar. But once you get AIDS, everything gets ugly.

The first person I know who died from AIDS used to tease everybody about how “Pretty” he was. By the time he had full-blown AIDS, he was not a pretty sight. He was a quarter of his original weight, he had lesions all over his body and he ultimately died of TB of the brain. That’s what his obituary said but his post mortem said HIV.

Victim number two was a good friend for a season and he certainly was good looking, blessed with wealth and was in every ritzy party in his time. He was young, gay, and full of life until he started acting funny, “loosing it” at times and then the scary downward spiral both mentally and financially happened. He got so broke; I had to help him out financially at least once. Unfortunately he did not have real family or built up true friendships because of his same sex orientation.

He got sick often, saying it was the flu, a cough, a fever, something he ate, pneumonia etc. I suspected he had AIDS but as a friend we deny something so ugly. He eventually lost his condo, sold all his material possessions, disconnected socially and in the end both his shame and “pride” led him to live out his final days as a pauper in the province.

The last one was someone people call “Silahis” or bisexual. He became such I suppose, as a survivor and out of curiosity. But he eventually straightened out and became deeply religious. Sadly finding God does not necessarily exempt us from the consequences of our past. By the time he found God, got married and had a family, he did not realize that AIDS had already found him. His utter shame was no match to the utter horror and pain of his wife and children.

I share these accounts to drive a point. Condoms are not the answer. Real Life, Real Stories, Real People, Real Pain and Real Caring, that’s real medicine. Not condoms.

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