HIV: The Morning After Podcast Por Dan Hall arte de portada

HIV: The Morning After

HIV: The Morning After

De: Dan Hall
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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 Biografías y Memorias Ciencia Ciencias Sociales Higiene y Vida Saludable
Episodios
  • dan glass: Rage, Resistance, Reconnection

    dan glass: Rage, Resistance, Reconnection
    Apr 9 2026
    Summarydan glass was born in 1983, the year HIV was first identified as HIV rather than the gay plague. They grew up under Thatcher's Section 28 with only EastEnders' Mark Fowler and tombstone adverts for reference. Death, isolation, internalised stigma - that was all HIV meant. When dan was diagnosed in their early twenties, they got drunk, went to a friend's house, cried, and she helped them to the toilet. The next morning, they told their boss it wasn't flu after all.For five years, dan refused treatment. The fear was too deep, the conditioning too absolute. Section 28 had taught them they were wrong, that whatever happened was their fault, that no one would help. The gravity of that silence was lethal. When dan finally saw a doctor in Berlin who told them their CD4 count meant they had AIDS, they collapsed in the shower the next day.What followed was transformation through community. A friend in Berlin, Juliana, threw a party where everyone screamed in each other's faces and painted their feet white to pre-empt the side effects dan feared most. The next morning, in Tempelhof park, dan took their first pills. A lover named Terry introduced them to ACT UP. dan went down the rabbit hole and never came back.Since then, dan has co-founded the reformed ACT UP London, organised die-ins in Trafalgar Square, helped secure PrEP access through spectacular direct action, written two books on queer radical history, co-founded Bender Defenders for queer self-defence, and is about to open London's first community-run LGBTQ+ space at the Joiners Arms. According to Nigel Farage, they're scum. dan takes that as a compliment.This is the final episode of series two, and it's a fitting end: grief alchemised into action, silence challenged at every turn, and friendship held up as political resistance.Timestamped Takeaways00:02:43 - Section 28 meant death. Growing up under Thatcher, HIV meant death, isolation, internalised stigma, your own fault. Mark Fowler on EastEnders was the only reference. There were no queer friends, no ropes to hang on to.00:04:22 - Missing stories. What was missing from those messages was the brilliance of the community. People weren't told the true human stories. Section 28 silenced homosexuality in schools, libraries, public institutions. dan grew up in a religious, conservative environment where being gay was an abomination. Silence layered on silence.00:06:27 - Seroconversion. dan had what seemed like flu but wasn't. A doctor in Brighton said those three letters. It struck deep. dan didn't know what it meant scientifically or socially—just death. They got drunk, went to a friend's house, cried, and she helped them to the toilet.00:08:23 - Telling friends one by one. It was emotionally exhausting. So dan decided to do it all at once: a show called Shafted, based on Stars in Their Eyes, on the 25th anniversary of ACT UP. At the end, they were fired from a 12-foot cock-shaped human cannon across the audience, announcing: "Tonight everyone, I'm living with HIV."00:10:47 - Five years without treatment. dan refused medication despite it being available. Living with HIV is more than pills into bodies. Fear, internalised stigma, the conditioning that you were doomed—Section 28's pathology was hyper-individualism. You had to parent yourself because you were told you were wrong.00:12:08 - Shingles in Glasgow. dan's nurse called it "the red roses from hell." Their immune system was in a bad way. Stress correlated with sickness. White things on the tongue, red rashes—signs the body was failing. Still, dan was rigid with fear.00:13:44 - Berlin and the truth. A doctor in Berlin, smoking fags in a tight white shirt, gave dan the statistics. They went home, looked up what it meant, and realised they had AIDS. They collapsed in the shower the next day.00:15:09 - Juliana's party. dan was terrified of the side effects—nightmares, white feet. Juliana threw a party where everyone screamed in each other's faces and painted their feet white. You face fear by facing it.00:17:03 - First pills in Tempelhof. The next morning, in dan's favourite park, they swallowed the pills. Game changer. Choice made. The physiological symptoms cleared rapidly.00:17:51 - Terry's challenge. A lover named Terry, an ACT UP Paris activist, challenged dan's shame. "It's not your shame. It's society's." They went to bed. The next morning, Terry told dan about ACT UP. dan went down the rabbit hole.00:19:13 - The second silence. Around 2014, HIV was in what activists called "the second silence": rising transmissions among certain populations without access, cuts to education and support due to austerity, and a general belief that HIV was a thing of the 80s and 90s.00:20:28 - Peter Staley and reformation. dan contacted Peter Staley, protagonist of How to Survive a Plague, organised a screening in London, and met Andrea Morden, a lifelong ACT UP activist whose partner John had died of AIDS. That meeting led to the reformation of ACT UP...
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    1 h y 2 m
  • Nikolaj Tange Lange: Porn, Punk, Perspective

    Nikolaj Tange Lange: Porn, Punk, Perspective
    Apr 2 2026
    SummaryIn 2007, Nikolaj Tange Lange wrote a punk song with the chorus "Gay is the new punk because we don't give a fuck about dying while we're young." A few months later, he tested positive for HIV. He was 27, newly arrived in Berlin, and had just discovered a city where condoms were already the exception in dark rooms and sex clubs. The song, it turned out, was prophecy.Nikolaj is a Danish writer and musician who has spent nearly two decades navigating the gap between what the world thinks HIV means and what it actually means to live with it. He's published five novels, performed in porn under his real name, and written extensively about transgressive sex, chemsex, and queer culture. His novel Romeo and Seahorse is available in English from Cipher Press.The night of infection was at a party during the Berlin Film Festival. A guy with a mohawk, a few beers left on the coffee table, straight to the bedroom. Nikolaj told him to stop, but was slow about it. He was drunk, high, in it. Two weeks later, he was in hospital with pneumonia so severe he could barely move. The Western blot confirmed the infection was recent. Mohawk guy was the one.What's striking about Nikolaj's story is his refusal of blame. He continued to see Mohawk guy afterwards because he was hot, because he was funny, because “once you stop being afraid of HIV, a new world opens”. He doesn't know whether he tested positive because he stopped being afraid, or whether he stopped being afraid because he tested positive. Does it even matter?The conversation ranges across pre-PrEP Berlin, the transgressive thrill of bareback sex, the codes of "safer sex needs discussion" on Gay Romeo, and the way stigma gets reproduced even in attempts to break it. Nikolaj is wary of the Drag Race moment where someone comes out as positive and the strings swell and everyone hugs and says how important it is to keep having this conversation. A taboo, he argues, is not something we don't talk about. It's something we keep reproducing as a taboo by talking about it as one.Timestamped Takeaways00:02:10 - Berlin, autumn 2007. A party during the film festival. A guy with a mohawk. Beers left on the coffee table, straight to the bedroom. Drunk, slightly high, post-high. He sticks his dick inside without a condom. Nikolaj tells him to stop, but hesitates.00:04:08 - Pre-PrEP Berlin. The song "Gay is the New Punk" was inspired by Nikolaj's experience of arriving in Berlin and realising everyone was having sex without condoms. In dark rooms and leather bars, condoms were already the exception. You could ask for one, but it was a choice.00:05:19 - Disbelief before arrival. Before moving to Berlin, Nikolaj heard friends' stories about Connection, the big gay club, and didn't believe them. How could people be choosing this? Then he met friends living with HIV who seemed perfectly healthy. The narrative he'd internalised didn't match what he saw.00:06:31 - danish awareness campaigns. Growing up in Denmark, HIV awareness ads played between afternoon TV programmes. The message was absolute: use a condom or die. Not using one wasn't an option. It wasn't even a thought.00:08:00 - Transgression as intimacy. Nikolaj didn't initially experience bareback sex as more physically intimate. The difference came later, when it became part of a scene where irresponsibility and transgression were the point. For queer people whose existence is already transgressive, doing something transgressive is exciting.00:09:11 - Fear and freedom. For years, sex had been associated with fear and responsibility. Once Nikolaj stopped being afraid, he tested positive. He doesn't know which came first.00:09:43 - Two weeks later. The coughing starts. Pain in the back and chest, each feeding the other. By evening, he can barely move. His flatmate takes him to the emergency room.00:11:28 - The test. They ask about his HIV status at the hospital. He doesn't know. They test. The next morning, it's positive. A Western blot confirms the infection was recent. Mohawk guy was the one.00:12:10 - Prognosis at 27. The doctors told him he'd probably make it to 60, which at 27 felt like "whatever." He thought he'd die a little sooner, but old enough that it wouldn't make a significant difference.00:13:05 - Quitting smoking. The pneumonia was partly caused by smoking 50 cigarettes a day. Nikolaj quit and hasn't missed one since. His doctor told him smoking a pack a day is probably worse for your health than being HIV positive.00:13:48 - The ghost patient. The hospital had a special ward for HIV patients that no longer exists. Nikolaj felt grateful for the connection to history—this was where terminal patients had come in the worst years. A young man there looked very ill. Nikolaj felt the weight of now carrying something that was part of queer history.00:17:50 - Mohawk guy again. Nikolaj kept seeing him afterwards. Because he was hot. Because he was funny. Because once you don't need to be sensible about sex, a new ...
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    44 m
  • “Jan”: Borders, Belonging, Becoming

    “Jan”: Borders, Belonging, Becoming
    Mar 26 2026
    SummaryJan describes himself as a global citizen. He is Turkish, Kurdish, gay, and HIV positive, and he's had to come out about each of those identities separately. Growing up in Ankara, he learned early to hide parts of himself. Kurdish was spoken at home but never taught to the children. It was too dangerous, too divisive. By fourteen, Jan had figured out that status and achievement could compensate for ethnic complexity. By the time he realised he was gay, he understood that no amount of status would protect him. His ticket out was a scholarship abroad.The plan worked. Jan got his master's degree in the United States, had a job lined up, a future mapped. Then Covid happened. He lost his visa, his right to work, and found himself back in his parents' flat in Ankara, confined with them for 34 days straight during lockdown. A casual homophobic remark made him snap. He came out as gay in the middle of a pandemic, in a 70-square-metre flat, with nowhere to go.He had arrived in Turkey with two weeks of PrEP left. There was no way to get more. When lockdowns lifted briefly, he met someone, asked if they were on PrEP, was told yes, and chose to have unprotected sex. Two weeks later, burning with fever, convinced it was Covid, he tested negative twice before realising it was HIV. The healthcare system was overwhelmed. Hospitals wouldn't admit non-Covid patients. Jan had to fake having Covid just to get through the doors. A doctor saw him in her personal time, sleepless after a night in intensive care. He borrowed money from friends, persuaded a pharmacy to release medication before state reimbursement came through, and took his first pill in a park, crying with relief.Jan's voice has been altered for this episode to protect his identity. He is not yet out to his parents about his HIV status. He is still learning what it means to him.Timestamped Takeaways00:02:14 - Three identities to hide. Jan grew up in Turkey, a country of hidden diversity. Kurdish was spoken at home but not taught to the children. Being gay added another layer. Being HIV positive came later.00:02:50 - Forced assimilation. The Turkish nation-state was built on a new meta-identity. Armenians, Greeks, Arabs, Circassians, Kurds—all were expected to sacrifice their past to be accepted. You learned to be overly apologetic, to over-tolerate hate remarks.00:06:28 - Growing up in Ankara. A boringly stable place, very safe, but suffocating for a young gay person of mixed ethnicity. Jan went from school to home, avoiding the other kids. It felt too exposing.00:08:29 - Status as armour. Up to fourteen, Jan focused on hiding his Kurdish identity through achievement. Power and status could compensate for ethnic complexity. Then puberty arrived, and he realised sexuality couldn't be hidden the same way.00:09:25 - The scholarship. Jan worked hard for a scholarship to go abroad. He felt doomed if he stayed in Turkey as a gay man. Freedom required leaving.00:10:18 - Covid takes everything. Jan had his master's degree, a job lined up, plans. Then the pandemic hit. He lost his visa and had to return to Turkey, back to the same environment he'd fought to escape.00:10:56 - 34 days in 70 square metres. Confined with his parents during lockdown, a casual homophobic remark made Jan explode. He came out as gay. The world was doomed, people were dying, and the people who were supposed to love him were saying something offensive about who he was.00:12:15 - Two weeks of PrEP left. Jan had been on PrEP in the US. In Turkey, it was nearly impossible to access—expensive, available only in select pharmacies in Istanbul, unknown to most doctors.00:14:55 - Risk perception shifts. When you're deprived of touch, when nobody has held you with care, your risk perception changes. You start questioning less. The conversation about PrEP became performative: do you miss intimacy? Do you want this moment where two bodies connect?00:18:39 - Convinced it was Covid. Two weeks after unprotected sex, Jan was burning with fever, convinced he was bringing Covid home to his parents. He asked them to leave. The tests came back negative. Twice.00:20:28 - The phone call. A private clinic ran sexual health tests. Hepatitis C was negative. The HIV result was sent to public health authorities. Jan knew.00:21:21 - Alone at home. The first time HIV hits your body, it feels horrible. Jan sat down and cried, then got up and asked himself: what have I actually lost? If he could get medication, nothing.00:25:26 - On the state roster. In Turkey, once public health confirms your status, you're in the system for life. It affects everything, including mandatory military service. HIV-positive men are exempt.00:25:52 - Faking Covid to get through the door. Hospitals wouldn't admit non-Covid patients. Jan pretended to have Covid to get past security. The clinics were ghost towns. The doctor who finally saw him was sleepless, zombie-like, but attentive for two minutes. It was enough.00:29:06 - Ten ...
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    51 m
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