All of us at The Spahr Center hope you are taking good care of yourselves and loved ones, and that you remain healthy! If there is anything we can do to help you get through this, please be in touch at info@thespahrcenter.org or call me at 415.886.8551. Let me begin by acknowledging our mighty team, my deep respect and appreciation go out to the entire staff of The Spahr Center. I shouldn’t be surprised at the way in which they have risen to the occasion with creativity, commitment and even more hard work. But I am sure grateful. We want all of you to know that our work definitely continues here at The Spahr Center. In order to minimize physical contact between all individuals, staff is working remotely during the shelter in place. Services for clients are by appointment only at 415-457-2487
Programs and Services Updates
Leandro, Case Management Assistant, is phoning all of our 220 HIV-positive clients to check-in on them and assess their needs so the rest of our awesome HIV services team (Leslie, David, and Maria) can take care of those needs. Our food pantry continues to be stocked and is operational; however, to further minimize person-to-person contact we will either make a delivery to you at home or fill a bag for you to pick-up in our lobby. Please contact us to get set up with a delivery or to make arrangements for a pick-up. Andy and Rhiannon on our Harm Reduction team have implemented new policies and procedures at our syringe access sites to assure the safety of all staff, volunteers and clients. We are pleased the County agrees that our lifesaving harm reduction services are an essential service that must continue providing clean syringes, safe injection supplies, as well as Naloxone (Narcan). Fel, our LGBTQ Youth Program Coordinator, is maintaining close contact with, and organizing virtual gatherings for, our queer youth in an effort to keep them connected to each other and their community. This connection is especially important for youth whose experiences of rejection at home and challenges with self-esteem are being exacerbated as a result of being home 24/7. Nancy Flaxman, LGBT Senior Discussion Group Facilitator has called all of the discussion group participants to check in, assess needs, and arrange to have others be in touch to prevent isolation. I am happy to announce that we were able to let Nancy return to retirement as Bill Blackburn comes aboard as our Interim Senior Program Coordinator to expand our services in this area. Our Mental Health team, Deb, Debbie and Ari are expanding our capacity to offer individual therapy to all of our clients as a result of increased funding for our mental health services.
Lastly, some fantastic news – our own Jane Spahr has been elected Community Grand Marshall of the 2020 San Francisco Pride Parade & Celebration! Thank you to everyone who voted to make sure she received this great honor. We obviously had great voter turnout from Janie’s massive family of admirers! I watched Jane’s remarkable leadership and achievements from across the bridge during my San Francisco-based career – a beacon of light coming from Marin County. It was so clear what a powerful force for good she was in the world; making certain that LGBTQ+ people in Marin are respected and thriving, that the county’s response to HIV/AIDS is comprehensive and effective, and leading advocacy to insist that Christian institutions be more Christian. Very recently, Jane has also helped to open Trans Heartline, a home in San Anselmo that welcomes transgender people post-surgery and supports their recovery. I only had the joy of meeting Jane upon joining the staff of The Spahr Center, and I feel more whole with her warm and encouraging presence in my life. I thank her for all of the support she has provided as we strengthen the work of this agency. Today we acutely feel the need for compassionate, courageous and visionary leadership – the kind that is only second nature for Jane (for President)!
People have been great about sending me interesting things that I thought would be good to share with others. Hopefully you’re not inundated. Here are a few:
This astronaut spent a year in space, here are his tips on thriving and surviving in isolation!
Are you sure you’re washing your hands well? Check out this video!
Opera fan? You’re in luck! The Met is streaming a different encore presentation from the company’s Live in HD series each night. Each performance will be available for a period of 23 hours, from 7:30 p.m. EDT until 6:30 p.m. the following day.
The Monterey Bay Aquarium is live streaming videos of of some of their best attractions! From coral reefs to kelp forests, and don’t forget to check out the shark habitat.
What a great time to practice yoga, with our very own Janna Barkin! Join her on Facebook live at 12:30 pm Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays or find her teaching at YogaWorks Live.
Here is a great list of things to do online – somewhat youth focused, but we’re all young at heart!
I want to express our deep gratitude to BioMarin, which has very generously become a Visionary Sponsor of The Spahr Center’s 5th Anniversary celebration. Enormous gratitude to the LGBTQ+ employee group at the company for this exciting partnership. Finally, we will have news on the status of our May 31 fundraising event and Pride Picnic soon! Our warmest regards. Once again, do not hesitate to be in touch if there is something we can help with, or if you have questions and comments. We will conquer this, together! Dana Van Gorder
Want to know which California counties are evidently not doing a very good job of obeying the statewide shelter-in-place order that has been in effect for over a week now?
The data company Unacast, a firm that collects cell phone location data for private companies, created an interactive map that shows which counties in California and beyond are correctly “socially distancing” by staying at home.
Each county and state is graded on an A-F basis on the “change in average mobility,” or the decline in distance traveled since quarantine measures were first put in place.
“To calculate the actual underlying social indexing score we combine tens of millions of anonymous mobile phones and their interactions with each other each day – and then extrapolate the results to the population level,” Unacast writes in its methodology.
While it is somewhat unnerving to know we’re being unwittingly tracked at all times, the data is useful in providing a picture of social distancing at work.
The state of California received an “A” grade overall thanks to a 40 percent decline in average distanced traveled, but several counties — all in rural areas with few reported cases — have actually logged an increase in distance traveled since the shelter-in-place order was issued. However, this could be partially explained by the fact that residents of these counties have to drive further to reach grocery stores, restaurants for takeout and other essential services.
Every Bay Area county with the exception of Solano County received an “A” grade, and the region’s numbers for reductions in average distance traveled is in line with other national hot spots including New York City and New Orleans. Here are the nine Bay Area counties ranked in order of “best at social distancing” to worst:
The number of anti-LGBTQ hate groups soared 43 percent last year, rising from 49 groups in 2018 to 70 in 2019, according to a recent report from the Southern Poverty Law Center.
“Groups that vilify the LGBTQ community, in fact, represented the fastest-growing sector among hate groups in 2019,” the report states. The SPLC found the surge in anti-LGBTQ groups occurred amid an overall decrease in hate groups last year, which dropped to 940 from an all-time high of 1,020 in 2018.
The report said the surge was “possibly fueled by continued anti-LGBTQ sentiment and policy emanating from government officials,” largely attributing it to the Trump administration.
“Anti-LGBTQ groups have become intertwined with the Trump administration, and — after years of civil rights progress and growing acceptance among the broader American public — anti-LGBTQ sentiment within the Republican Party is rising,” the report states. “Though Trump promised during his campaign to be a ‘real friend’ to the LGBTQ community, he has fully embraced anti-LGBTQ hate groups and their agenda of dismantling federal protections and resources for LGBTQ people.”
Then Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump holds a rainbow flag given to him by a supporter during a campaign rally at the University of Northern Colorado on Oct. 30, 2016 in Greeley, Colo.Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images file
In a statement sent to NBC News, White House spokesman Judd Deere called SPLC a “far-left smear organization” and said its “comments are disgusting.” He also pointed to the president’s track record on LGBTQ issues, saying Trump has “fought for inclusion and repeatedly condemned hate and violence.”
The Southern Poverty Law Center defines a hate group as “an organization that — based on its official statements or principles, the statements of its leaders, or its activities — has beliefs or practices that attack or malign an entire class of people, typically for their immutable characteristics.”
Most of the growth in new anti-LGBTQ hate groups, SPLC’s report found, comes from grassroots churches.
One example is the expansion in the network of churches run by Steven Anderson. Anderson runs Faithful World Baptist Church, in Tempe, Arizona, which has been listed as a hate group by the SPLC for some time. The church, according to its website, believes “homosexuality is a sin and an abomination which God punishes with the death penalty.”
Faithful World Baptist Church did not respond to NBC News’ request for comment.
Many of the 70 “anti-LGBTQ hate groups” in SPLC’s report are well established.
President Donald Trump shakes hands with Family Research Council president Tony Perkins at the 2017 Value Voters Summit on Oct. 13, 2017 in Washington.Evan Vucci / AP file
One of the best known is the Family Research Council, which was founded in 1983 and hosts the annual Value Voters Summit for conservative politicians and thousands of participants each year. At last year’s summit, President Donald Trump repeated his opposition to the Equality Act, a bill passed by the House that would extend federal nondiscrimination protections to LGBTQ people.
Lecia Brooks, an SPLC spokesperson, told NBC News that the council’s long-time president, Tony Perkins, has been granted “unfettered access” to the Trump administration. Notably, Perkins was appointed to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.
Following Perkins’ appointment to the independent, bipartisan commission, the national LGBTQ advocacy group GLAAD compiled a list of more than 30 examples of Perkins’ and FRC’s opposition to the rights of LGBTQ people in the U.S. and abroad. Among those examples are a comparison of same-sex marriage to a marriage between “a man and his horse”; calling the “It Gets Better” project, an initiative designed to help LGBTQ young people cope with bullying and marginalization, “disgusting” and a “concerted effort” to recruit kids into the gay “lifestyle”; and claiming that the “blood” of “young Marines” would be on the hands of lawmakers who voted to repeal the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.
The Family Research Council did not respond to a request for comment.
Another “anti-LGBTQ hate group” named in the report is the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian legal group with attorneys across the country and a long track record of litigating against LGBTQ rights.
In a lawsuit that made national headlines last year, ADF represented Jack Phillips, a Christian baker who refused to make a cake for a gay wedding, in a narrow victory at the Supreme Court. ADF is also involved in another Supreme Court case dealing with LGBTQ workers rights, representing a Detroit funeral home that fired an employee after she informed the home that she was undergoing a gender transition. Among its non-Supreme Court cases, ADF is currently representing three athletes in a suit against the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference, which adopted a policy allowing transgender girls to compete in interscholastic sports with cisgender high school girls.
Jeremy Tedesco, ADF’s senior counsel and vice president of U.S. advocacy, slammed the Southern Poverty Law Center and the timing of its new report, which was released March 18.
“It is appalling that the Southern Poverty Law Center would choose this time of national emergency to launch their divisive and false ‘hate report,’” Tedesco told NBC News. “We call on SPLC to retract the report, stop sowing division and join the rest of America against our common foe: COVID-19.”
Brooks dismissed criticisms of SPLC releasing its annual report during the coronavirus pandemic.
“Fighting hate is something we have to keep at the forefront of our minds,” she said. “They don’t take a break, and we don’t take a break either.”
Westboro Baptist Church, known for its public protests that consistently feature signs with homophobic messages like “God Hates Fags,” also appears on the SPLC’s list. In 2019, the grouppicketed Morehouse College and Spelman College after the two historically black, single-sex institutions changed their admissions policy to include transgender students.
Jonathan Phelps, a spokesperson for the church, told NBC News that the SPLC is “not being honest” in their characterization of the Westboro Baptist Church as a hate group.
“We don’t discriminate. Whatever your favorite sin is, if you ask us about it we are going to articulate in the plainest language possible what the Lord Jesus Christ has said about it,” he said. Regarding homosexuality, “it is an abomination,” Phelps added.
Brooks said SPLC stands by its “hate group” designations and dismissed criticisms that the organization disproportionately focuses on religious groups.
“We are not against Christian groups,” Brooks said. “For us, it’s more about the way they go out of their way to demonize LGBTQ folks.”
Brooks also lamented the lack of public pushback against many of these groups.
“Sadly, there is not enough public outcry against anti-LGBTQ groups because we have just let it go saying, ‘That’s just their religion,’” she said.
History of ‘anti-LGBTQ hate’
The SPLC has been tracking the number of hate groups in the United States since 1990, but the anti-LGBTQ movement emerged decades before.
“Along the same lines that you see today, they put forward stereotypes and vilify, especially gay men, as predators and predators of children, and use that to justify the tactics of taking rights way from LGBTQ people,” Fetner explained.
Fetner cited as an early example the activism of Anita Bryant in Florida. The singer-turned-anti-gay-activist was behind the “Save Our Children” campaign, which in 1977 helped overturn a newly passed local ordinance in Miami-Dade County that prohibited discrimination based on sexual orientation in employment, housing and public services.
“It caught on with socially conservative evangelical communities, and sort of blossomed and became the lead issue of the Religious Right,” Fetner said.
The late 1970s also saw the emergence of Jerry Falwell’s Moral Majority, a political action group that wielded significant influence in the Republican Party. Fetner said Falwell realized early on that raising issues of sexuality was both “titillating and scandalous” enough to prompt followers to make sizable donations to his organization.
“The Religious Right really inserted itself into the Republican Party in the ‘80s and ‘90s and has had an influence in American politics ever since,” she added. However, Fetner said the movement began to decline in the 1990s.
“Young evangelicals weren’t as interested in anti-gay activism as the older folks,” she said. At the same time, acceptance of homosexuality was on the rise in the U.S., across all segments of the population. “People were actually changing their minds.”
By the early 2000s, the U.S. reached a tipping point for acceptance of homosexuality, according to a Pew study, and by 2016, LGBTQ advocates had solidified many civil rights gains, such as the legalization of same-sex marriage.
Why are we seeing a surge?
So, what changed?
“Trump’s embrace of these groups, their leaders and their policy agenda fuels this growth,” Brooks said of the rise in “anti-LGBTQ hate groups.”
The report points to significant staffing and policy choices by the Trump administration that reflect the position of organizations on the SPLC’s growing anti-LGBTQ list.
Since taking office, the Trump administration has rolled back several protections for LGBTQ people through executive orders, includingnondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ workers employed by federal contractors.
“The administration has consistently claimed that laws and regulations that prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex do not apply to LGBTQ people and has worked to install religious exemptions to civil rights laws,” the report states.
In addition, nearly one third of the administration’s judicial nominees boast anti-LGBTQ track records, according to a report by Lambda Legal.
“Religious conservatives have taken this as an opportunity to push back on any civil rights gains LGBTQ folks have made,” Brooks said. “They couch it in ‘religious freedom,’” she added.
“I think that anti-gay activism is swept up as part of this new social embrace of intolerance and right-wing attitudes of all kinds,” Fetner said.
“People are disgruntled, going online, getting misinformation and getting radicalized,” she added. “Some portion of these people are joining new organizations or new churches.”
Fetner sees the Trump administration is both the outcome of this broader phenomenon, and a catalyst for increased anti-LGBTQ activism.
“Trump’s win was a signal to these larger social forces that this is their moment,” she said.
What’s the impact?
Anti-LGBTQ groups have a significant impact on policy outcomes, social violence and the priorities of LGBTQ advocacy organizations, according to civil rights advocates and scholars.
“Extremist ideas long believed outside of the realm of legitimate politics are penetrating deeply into the mainstream, spawning public policies that target immigrants, LGBTQ people and Muslims,” the report states.
Shannon Minter, legal director for the National Center for Lesbian Rights, said this “pattern of escalating attacks has put the LGBT movement on the defensive” and caused advocacy groups to invest a “tremendous amount of resources to deal with these attacks.”
Fetner said most LGBTQ advocacy groups are funded at “a fraction of the Religious Right groups that were proposing these initiatives.” She said that means they’re “sucked into these battles where their very right to exist is on the table again,” and they’re “putting out fires that have been started by better resourced organizations.”
The SPLC report and LGBTQ advocates also connect the surge in “anti-LGBTQ hate groups” to violence against LGBTQ people.
The FBI’s most recent Hate Crime Statistics report, released in November, found nearly 20 percent of all reported hate crimes in 2018 were motivated by anti-LGBTQ bias. While reported anti-LGBTQ hate crimes grew from 2017 to 2018, the most growth was seen in reports of anti-trans violence, which increased 34 percent year-over-year.
“I don’t think the anti-LGBTQ movement will win, but the damage they can do along the way is substantial,” Fetner said. Despite this, she remains optimistic, saying, “The LGBTQ movement will carry on and will come out of it stronger.”
Idaho Governor Brad Little Monday evening signed into law two bills that place new restrictions on transgender individuals in the state. The first of the two bills the Republican governor signed targets a transgender person’s ability to request a birth certificate change.
Under the new law, transgender individuals will no longer be able to change their listed sex on their official birth certificates and the certificate can only be amended within a single year of its initial filing. After that year has expired, the only grounds on which the certificate could be changed would be “fraud, duress, or material mistake of fact.”
The second transgender-related bill Little signed Monday bans transgender woman and girls from participating in women’s sports sponsored by public schools, colleges and universities.
Very few people have the breadth and depth of experience with infectious disease — scientific, activist, and personal — as Gregg Gonsalves.
Gonsalves was a leading member of ACT UP, a militant activist group that played a vital role in waking the American public up to the HIV/AIDS epidemic of the 1980s and ‘90s. An HIV-positive gay man, he spent the following decades doing research and activism surrounding AIDS and other infectious diseases. He has a PhD from Yale University in epidemiology, where he’s currently a professor studying microbial diseases, and received a MacArthur fellowship (more commonly known as a Genius Grant) in 2018.
So when we spoke on the phone this week and he sounded the alarm about the Trump administration’s push to relax coronavirus quarantine measures as soon as possible, I got a little panicked.
“The rest of the United States [will be like] New York two weeks from now,” he told me. “You can’t relax social distancing now without risking a conflagration.”
In his mind, Trump’s handling of the crisis feels like an eerie callback to the 1980s, when then-President Ronald Reagan chose to ignore early warnings about the threat from HIV/AIDS. About 450,000 Americans died of the disease between 1981 and 2000, a toll that Gonsalves believes can (at least in part) be blamed on Reagan’s “malign neglect” of the outbreak. For Gonsalves, the Trump response to coronavirus feels like the same thing all over again — just with the time frame sped way up.
We talked about his view of the science and policy surrounding coronavirus as well as the lessons the AIDS epidemic has for Americans today — not just when it comes to policy, but also what ordinary people can do to make things better despite being stuck at home.
A transcript of our conversation follows, edited for length and clarity.
Zack Beauchamp
What do you think happens in a world where certain parts of the country start ending restrictions on business activity?
Gregg Gonsalves
You don’t have to be an epidemiologist to figure that one out: viruses don’t respect state borders. If we’re going to sort of be able to contain this outbreak, it’s going to have to be a national commitment.
Ron DeSantis, governor of Florida, and the governor of Mississippi have said they’re not willing to do these sorts of stay-at-home orders; I think the governor of Mississippi overruled local officials on this. We already have a patchwork of responses to the epidemic. New York City may be the epicenter of the epidemic right now, but there’s only a matter of time until it spreads to Miami and Tupelo and New Orleans — which [currently] has some of the largest increases in cases.
Everybody said we were in Italy two weeks ago. The rest of the United States is New York two weeks from now.
Unless we figure out how to sort of move toward what the New York Times called for the other day — a national lockdown of sorts — we’re just going to see cases increase and emergency rooms and ICUs across the country be filled to capacity. People no longer being in the hospital, but in morgues around the country — and people unable to bury their dead for risk of infection to themselves. It’s pretty clear what the choices are for us.
Zack Beauchamp
This isn’t controversial among epidemiologists, right? I want to be clear.
Gregg Gonsalves
No.
We’re operating off of public health history and what’s happened with other epidemics. We did this SARS, we did this with H1N1, we’ve done this with Ebola. It’s not different now except that this is a more widespread pandemic than we’ve seen before.
The models differ a little bit, but their implication is the same: Without extreme social distancing, we’re going to unleash the virus and potentially collapse our health systems. You can’t relax social distancing now without risking a conflagration.
Park Avenue in New York City, the epicenter of the coronavirus epidemic in the US, has been closed off to make it easier for pedestrians to maintain social distancing.
Zack Beauchamp
Is there a world in which the United States could adopt an approach more like what you see in South Korea — where you have much more widespread testing and you have contact tracing of people who are infected? Or are we past the point of no return on that kind of approach?
Gregg Gonsalves
Could’ve, should’ve, would’ve.
Three months ago, we could have used the WHO tests instead of developing a CDC test that was so defective that they had to start from scratch. If we were going to do scale-up of testing and contact tracing to contain the epidemic, it would have started happening in late December, early January. We’re now in a case where the virus is everywhere.
We do need to scale-up testing. We need to know how far and how deep this epidemic goes across the US, but we’re in the mitigation phase. There’s hundreds of thousands — if not millions — infected with the virus already. So we’re trying to sort of keep it from spreading further.
Testing is going to be an important part of that. Not just virus testing, but antibody testing to see who has been exposed and is no longer carrying the disease. Testing and contact tracing are going to be really important, but we’re at the end of March and we don’t have the testing capacity in the United States even to test everyone who comes into our hospitals to find out if they have Covid-19.
[The South Korea approach] is going to be our eventual way out. But we’re not there. We’re not even close.
Zack Beauchamp
You mentioned historical pandemics and epidemics earlier. I want to talk about the early HIV/AIDS outbreak, the most deadly recent outbreak in the US prior to Covid-19 — and a topic on which you’re a leading expert.
What lessons should we be taking from our own experience with a deadly epidemic in our country?
Gregg Gonsalves
We have two cases of sort of botched responses to epidemics out of neglect and incompetence.
In the 1980s, we had a president who ignored the AIDS epidemic for most of his presidency — didn’t mention AIDS until the seventh year of his two-year term. That malign neglect, which for President Reagan was probably based on homophobia and racism and fear of people who use drugs, is a very specific kind of malevolence and incompetence.
I don’t know how old you are, but I remember when the Legionnaires were in Philadelphia in that hotel [in 1976] and this new disease struck the hotel. The CDC was mobilized, there was a national mobilization over a few cases of a new unknown disease. A few years later, we had people screaming from the rooftops that [AIDS] is going to be a disaster — but nobody really was listening.
Zack Beauchamp
Does it feel like déjà vu when it comes to coronavirus — but sped up?
Gregg Gonsalves
The déjà vu is in a bumbling idiot of a president who is totally unprepared to do what’s necessary to deal with the health and wellbeing of the people he serves.
The mobilization outside of DC among ordinary people is completely different than what we saw in the early days of the [AIDS] epidemic. Just think of our heroic doctors and nurses in our hospitals, the academic community, the community of faith leaders. If we had this kind of mobilization back then, we would’ve been in much better shape, but we didn’t. We did among ourselves in the gay community, but we were a small group of people.
Today, it’s been a national mobilization — except at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Once again, we have a president who failed to take an epidemic seriously and ended up getting many of the people who he’s supposed to represent killed. “PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO FIGURE OUT HOW TO HELP THEIR NEIGHBORS IN A WAY THAT WE DON’T THINK ABOUT VERY MUCH IN OUR DAILY LIVES”
Zack Beauchamp
I don’t know if this is even the right way to think about this. But is there any way, based on your experiences with ACT UP, to describe what coronavirus activism might look like?
Is it the social solidarity that you’re describing earlier, in terms of community mobilization, or is there some kind of more directly political way to put pressure on the White House or governors or other authorities to do more?
Gregg Gonsalves
Weeks ago, old ACT UP alums and younger AIDS activists were all over this. Our antennae go up when we see infectious diseases get ignored and I think we were all talking about this in December and January. There’s a Covid-19 activist group in New York City that’s doing everything from diagnostics to social media.
My friend Amy Kapczynski at Yale Law School and I, who both have AIDS activist backgrounds, have written for the Boston Review talking about the political challenges of this pandemic. A lot of old AIDS activists have been central to this and it’s no coincidence that Debbie Birx and Tony Fauci are two old AIDS hands as well.
I don’t know how old you are, but I remember when the Legionnaires were in Philadelphia in that hotel [in 1976] and this new disease struck the hotel. The CDC was mobilized, there was a national mobilization over a few cases of a new unknown disease. A few years later, we had people screaming from the rooftops that [AIDS] is going to be a disaster — but nobody really was listening.
Zack Beauchamp
Does it feel like déjà vu when it comes to coronavirus — but sped up?
Gregg Gonsalves
The déjà vu is in a bumbling idiot of a president who is totally unprepared to do what’s necessary to deal with the health and wellbeing of the people he serves.
The mobilization outside of DC among ordinary people is completely different than what we saw in the early days of the [AIDS] epidemic. Just think of our heroic doctors and nurses in our hospitals, the academic community, the community of faith leaders. If we had this kind of mobilization back then, we would’ve been in much better shape, but we didn’t. We did among ourselves in the gay community, but we were a small group of people.
Today, it’s been a national mobilization — except at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Once again, we have a president who failed to take an epidemic seriously and ended up getting many of the people who he’s supposed to represent killed. “PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO FIGURE OUT HOW TO HELP THEIR NEIGHBORS IN A WAY THAT WE DON’T THINK ABOUT VERY MUCH IN OUR DAILY LIVES”
Zack Beauchamp
I don’t know if this is even the right way to think about this. But is there any way, based on your experiences with ACT UP, to describe what coronavirus activism might look like?
Is it the social solidarity that you’re describing earlier, in terms of community mobilization, or is there some kind of more directly political way to put pressure on the White House or governors or other authorities to do more?
Gregg Gonsalves
Weeks ago, old ACT UP alums and younger AIDS activists were all over this. Our antennae go up when we see infectious diseases get ignored and I think we were all talking about this in December and January. There’s a Covid-19 activist group in New York City that’s doing everything from diagnostics to social media.
My friend Amy Kapczynski at Yale Law School and I, who both have AIDS activist backgrounds, have written for the Boston Review talking about the political challenges of this pandemic. A lot of old AIDS activists have been central to this and it’s no coincidence that Debbie Birx and Tony Fauci are two old AIDS hands as well.
There’s been a very big mobilization around AIDS activists around the coronavirus epidemic, but the big challenge is that you can’t do what we used to do, which is to storm the NIH and seize control of the FDA — because you can’t leave your house.
Zack Beauchamp
That’s why I’m asking. A lot of people are sitting at home feeling impotent and scared; what would you tell them if somebody reading our interview thinks, “I would like to do something about this the way these AIDS activists are organizing”? What kinds of avenues for activism are there?
Gregg Gonsalves
Well first of all, they’re doing something really, really important right now. As I said, social distancing is an act of solidarity and generosity, it’s just tremendous. Think of the millions of people who are going out — maybe to go grocery shopping once a week.
The other thing is that we got to get more people to join the cause, and it means reaching young people who seem to feel a little bit immune to this. I was on the phone with a group of Harvard students earlier this week where they’re developing sort of a campaign called #WhyIStayHome. The idea is trying to reach out to people through social media; we have a lot more resources in terms of getting the word out about what needs to be done that is sort of proliferating across the country.
I just retweeted an editorial from a West Virginia newspaper, which was simply brilliant saying, “We need to take this seriously” — really challenging what’s coming out of the White House in Charleston, West Virginia. We’re able to amplify that, an editorial in which you would mostly consider a red state.
Lots of stuff is happening. I think organizers from the Women’s March — I was on a call with them yesterday — are trying to figure out ways to keep the pressure on Congress, on governors, and local officials. Remember that the president can make whatever pronouncements he wants on social distancing, but it’s going to be the governors and mayors who decide what happens.
So a lot of activism can happen very locally, where you may know your mayor. You may know the member of your city council. You may be able to get on the phone with them and make change: It doesn’t matter if you reach Mike Pence or Donald Trump, if you’re reaching the governor of Rhode Island or the mayor of Hartford and saying, as a citizen of your state, as a citizen of your city, I expect you to hold the line and keep us together by keeping us apart.
Zack Beauchamp
You’ve tweeted, on #WhyIStayAtHome, that you’re someone who has HIV yourself. What does it feel like to move around in the world under these circumstances, especially as someone who’s — I’ve seen your picture — doesn’t look like the kind of older person we associate with being especially threatened by the coronavirus.
Gregg Gonsalves
Well, one is I’m not immunocompromised. I’ve been on antiretroviral therapy since 1996. I’m more than about 15 years with a stable HIV infection.
Zack Beauchamp
That’s great, that’s just great.
Gregg Gonsalves
But there are other people who have HIV who may be more compromised than I am. As I said in that tweet, my mother is 86 years old and I have a sister-in-law who has cancer. I worry about them more than I worry about myself. I’m no spring chicken; I’m 57 years old, so my chances, in general, are higher than yours of developing symptomatic disease.
But moving around in the world, I feel less physical risk than I do the weight of the history of the AIDS epidemic. Another epidemic being mishandled; it’s PTSD of a certain sort where you’re like, we’re really doing this again? I shouldn’t go to Las Vegas because I’m pretty unlucky, and I think a lot of us are feeling that way.
We have resilience and an ability to respond and to organize and know what to do. But we also know what it’s like to watch your loved ones die, these waves of dying friends, over the course of a month and years.
I don’t know anybody personally who’s died of coronavirus yet. But I’m waiting for the shoe to drop and it’s terrifying. Is it going to be my partner? Is it going to be any of my close work colleagues? Going to be somebody in my family? And that feeling is very reminiscent of the days of the AIDS epidemic because you were going to funeral after funeral.
I know the hospital here [in New Haven] is close to capacity in terms of its ICU beds. New York hospitals are the same way. And so the chances that you’re going to be able to get access to care with each passing day is going to become more remote because there’s not going to be enough beds to put you in. I’m petrified that I’m going to get a call from somebody who says I have it or somebody saying, he has it or she has it and they’re in the ICU or something like that.
Zack Beauchamp
Advice is almost the wrong word here, but do you have any guidance for helping people think through these emotions, that kind of fear, given your experience with an epidemic where people you knew were getting infected and dying?
Gregg Gonsalves
A member of ACT UP, an art critic named Douglas Crimp, wrote a big essay called “Mourning and Militancy.” He talked about how, in ACT UP, we were all sort of militant: fighting, and so didn’t really want to talk about how we felt about what was going on. He said that it was important to acknowledge the anger and the grief and the sadness you’re feeling, while sort of maintaining an outward focus, a commitment to making things better. As Vito Russo, another member of ACT UP said, “We have to be alive when this is all over to make sure it never happens again.”
So I think the advice for people is to understand what’s going on emotionally for you, the grief you’re feeling, the sadness you’re feeling — even if it’s not for somebody who’s gotten sick and died, but for the sort of life that we once all had in January or February. That life is over for the foreseeable future.
And it’s hard to believe they we’re all going to be the same after these next few months. Take it in, understand it. I’m not a touchy-feely person, but I think it means talking to people you care about either face to face if you’re in the same house with them, or online or whatever.
But don’t stew in it; say “there’s something I can do.” I can protect my community by social distancing. Whatever skills I have, I can contribute — I can write for a newspaper or I have power as a citizen in my city or my state. I can influence my elected officials on the phone or by email or other means of communication. … Face your emotions and your grief and then make sure that we can get through this together, with the fewest deaths and the least damage.
Three new cases of coronavirus were confirmed in Sonoma County on Sunday, increasing the number of local cases to 58 as the virus continues to spread in the United States.
Thirteen residents are being treated at area hospitals and 13 have recovered from the virus, the county reported Sunday.
Demographic information about the patients, withheld by public health officials until Friday when the county recorded its 50th case, show a disease that does not discriminate based on age, gender or location.
Twenty-eight of those diagnosed with coronavirus are in the 18-49 age group, 20 are 50-64 and 10 are 65 or older. Cases have come from throughout the county, according to county data.
Sonoma County Public Health Officer Dr. Sundari Mase said the demographic data is about what she expected to see, with one possible exception: She is pleased to see so few cases among people 65 and older.
George “Skip” Panse, a member of the Gay Men’s Chorus in South Florida, was busy greeting members with a smile and a big hug three weeks ago. Last Wednesday, he died of complications caused by coronavirus.
Panse has become a headline dreaded by all as the pandemic pelts the US. The nation has, within days, become a petri-dish of cases, hauling the highest amount of confirmed coronavirus cases in the world.
A church-goer known by loved ones for his sense of humour and passion for music, Panse’s death was confirmed Thursday by the executive director of the chorus on Facebook in a tearful post.
Loved ones mourn the loss of Gay Men’s Chorus singer George Panse who died from coronavirus.
“It is tough to know that Florida’s death toll from the Coronavirus has climbed to 23 and one of them is a dear man I knew and who was a member of the Gay Men’s Chorus of South Florida,” Mark Kent wrote.
“We lost Skip to the virus yesterday.
I am usually not public about personal pain, but I share this in the hope that it helps more people take this epidemic seriously. Please stay home and stay safe.
“My prayers for Skip’s loved ones.”
Tributes poured in for Panse, a regular attendee of the United Church of Christ Fort Lauderdale, as stunned church-goers, faith leaders and choir members regaled their favourite memories of him.
“As we all know, Skip had a great passion for music and he was fed spiritually by our music ministry,” senior pastor Patrick Rogers wrote on Facebook.
“And we will never forget Skip’s love for others and our community. Rest in Peace Brother, we know that you will always watch over us.
‘Every time you see a number, it’s someone’s mother.’
Rogers recalled with fondness the time Panse duetted with another choir member at a concert – “It was such a blessing to witness Skip share his gift with so many, I will never forget that presentation.”
Choir member Bill Spinosa said Panse’s passing should remind everyone to take the viral outbreak rampaging the world seriously, NBC South Floridareported.
Every time you see a number, it’s someone’s mother. It’s someone’s father. Somebody’s brother.
Spinosa said: It’s amazing and because people are dying alone in hospitals in the ICU, it’s even more devastating because there’s nobody there to hold their hand.”
“It just seems so surreal how I just saw him shy three weeks ago and he was just being the vibrant, high-spirited guy that he always was, every time I saw Skip he greeted me with a warm welcome and hug, we will definitely miss him,” Rodrick Minnis wrote.
“People this is so real, we really need to take care of ourselves in these difficult times, and social distancing is key.
An LGBT+ charity has said it has seen a huge increase in the number of calls to its helpline since the coronavirus pandemic started.
The UK-based LGBT Foundation said the number of calls received over the last week was more than double the number received in the same period last year.
Worryingly, the charity said countless LGBT+ people are seeking support as they are stuck self-isolating with abusive family and partners.
They also warned that self-isolation means many queer people have been forced back into the closet, while many more have faced severe financial issues due to the pandemic’s economic fallout.
Many LGBT+ people are trapped self-isolating with abusive families and partners during the coronavirus pandemic.
Over a five day period this week, the LGBT Foundation received its highest number of weekly calls to its helpline since the beginning of the year. The organisation said many queer people are experiencing “severe anxiety and concern” over the coronavirus pandemic.
Furthermore, the charity said they are anticipating call volumes to increase again after the UK went into full lockdown this week.
We’ve had people ringing up because they’re concerned about the effect COVID-19 would have on existing health issues.
The helpline, which is currently operating remotely, will soon see opening hours extended into evenings and weekends in order to offer the best care for LGBT+ people who are struggling.
Kayla Le Roux, a staff member on the LGBT Foundation’s helpline, said the huge number of people contacting them shows how difficult a time this is for queer people.
“We’ve had people ringing up because they’re concerned about the effect COVID-19 would have on existing health issues, people calling about being trapped with families or partners who are hostile to them, or just like everyone else scared about what the future holds,” Le Roux said.
“It’s great to be there for people providing that support and to be that lifeline for people, and I hope anyone out there who is feeling worried right now knows that the support is out there for them and we’re just a phone call away.”
The charity warned that some teenagers are stuck at home with abusive parents amid COVID-19 lockdown.
Chief executive of the LGBT Foundation Paul Martin said the spike in calls shows that many LGBT+ people need “reassurance and information in a time of uncertainty and confusion”.
“We are seeing some young LGBT teenagers trapped in their homes with abusive parents and not even school to provide respite, trans people no longer being able to live as the gender they identify due to family pressures and people in same-sex relationships isolated with their abusive partner,” Martin said.
“We’ve also been spending time thinking about the most at risk members of our communities – people over 70, those with underlying health conditions, and those living in domestic abuse situations,” he added.
Martin said he wants all LGBT+ people to know that they are “not alone” and urged queer people who are struggling at this time to contact their helpline.
The LGBT Foundation’s helpline can be contacted on 0345 3 30 30 30, 10am-6pm Monday to Friday or by emailing helpline@lgbt.foundation.
More than 100 LGBTQ+ organizations have signed an open letter outlining the added risk the novel coronavirus poses on the LGBTQ+ community.
Read letter below:
As the spread of the novel coronavirus a.k.a. COVID-19 increases, many LGBTQ+ people are understandably concerned about how this virus may affect us and our communities. The undersigned want to remind all parties handling COVID-19 surveillance, response, treatment, and media coverage that LGBTQ+ communities are among those who are particularly vulnerable to the negative health effects of this virus.
Our increased vulnerability is a direct result of three factors:
The LGBTQ+ population uses tobacco at rates that are 50% higher than the general population. COVID-19 is a respiratory illness that has proven particularly harmful to smokers.
The LGBTQ+ population has higher rates of HIV and cancer, which means a greater number of us may have compromised immune systems, leaving us more vulnerable to COVID-19 infections.
LGBTQ+ people continue to experience discrimination, unwelcoming attitudes, and lack of understanding from providers and staff in many health care settings, and as a result, many are reluctant to seek medical care except in situations that feel urgent – and perhaps not even then.
In addition, there are more than 3 million LGBTQ+ older people living in the United States. LGBTQ+ elders are already less likely than their heterosexual and cisgender peers to reach out to health and aging providers, like senior centers, meal programs, and other programs designed to ensure their health and wellness, because they fear discrimination and harassment. The devastating impact of COVID-19 on older people – the current mortality rate is at 15% for this population – makes this a huge issue for the LGBTQ+ communities as well.
LGBTQ+ communities are very familiar with the phenomena of stigma and epidemics. We want to urge people involved with the COVID-19 response to ensure that LGBTQ+ communities are adequately served during this outbreak. Depending on your role, appropriately serving our communities could involve any of the following actions:
Ensuring that media coverage notes the particular vulnerabilities of any person with pre-existing respiratory illnesses, compromised immune systems or who uses tobacco products. While populations – like LGBTQ+ communities – can be at increased risk, it is important to note the overall state of health that contributes to any person’s increased vulnerability to contracting COVID-19.
Ensuring health messaging includes information tailored to communities at increased risk for COVID-19, including LGBTQ+ populations. An example of such tailored messaging is including imagery of LGBTQ+ persons in any graphic ads.
Providing LGBTQ+ individuals resources to find welcoming providers, such as the ones provided here, if they are experiencing symptoms like a cough or fever and need to seek medical attention.
Ensuring funding to community health centers is distributed in a fashion that accounts for the additional burden anticipated by LGBTQ-identified health centers.
Whenever possible ensuring health agencies partner with community-based organizations to get messaging out through channels we trust.
Ensuring surveillance efforts capture sexual orientation and gender identity as part of routine demographics.
Ensuring health workers are directed to provide equal care to all regardless of their actual or perceived sexual orientation, gender identity/presentation, ability, age, national origin, immigration status, race, or ethnicity.
Ensuring that all COVID-19 responses take into account exceptionally vulnerable members of the LGBTQ+ communities, including our elders, bi people, and black and brown trans and gender nonconforming/nonbinary people.
Since xenophobic responses are heavily impacting the Asian American communities, ensuring all communications and responses related to COVID-19 attempt to counter any such xenophobic responses, avoid racial profiling, and discourage the public from doing so as well.
Ensuring LGBTQ+ health leadership, along with all providers and health care centers, are provided with timely and accurate information to disseminate.
As LGBTQ+ community and health leadership, the undersigned organizations offer to stand shoulder to shoulder with the mainstream health leadership to make sure we learn from history and do not allow any population to be disproportionately impacted or further stigmatized by a virus.
Initial signers:
Advocates for Youth
Advocating Opportunity
Alder Health Services
Antioch University MFA Program
Athlete Ally
Atlanta Pride Committee
BiNet USA
Black Lives Matter Houston
Bradbury-Sullivan LGBT Community Center
California LGBTQ Health and Human Services Network
The UK’s national LGBT+ health adviser is urging people to stop hooking-up during the coronavirus lockdown – making clear that the only safe sex is with yourself or “someone within your household”.
Dr Michael Brady, medical director at Terrence Higgins Trust, warned that hook-up culture could lead to the spread of coronavirus – which is not sexually transmitted, but can easily spread through close bodily contact.
In a blog post, Dr Brady made clear that people should not be venturing outside for hook-ups during the lockdown.
People need to stop having casual sex immediately, says LGBT+ health expert.
He explained: “The country is now on lockdown to slow the spread of coronavirus and that has to include not hooking-up for sex.
“I’ve never been an advocate of promoting abstinence, but this message is not about protecting your sexual health: it’s about protecting your general health and those around you from a virus that can be deadly.
“This is extraordinary and unprecedented advice for us to be giving out, but these are extraordinary and unprecedented times.”
THT’s Dr Michael Brady has urged people to stop hooking up during the lockdown
He continued: “This advice means that, unless you have sex with someone within your household, it’s important to find sexual pleasure in other ways.
“Despite the situation with COVID-19, we need to remember that sex is an important part of life, but right now we have to find other ways to achieve sexual pleasure and satisfaction.
“It’s only natural that we look to sex for pleasure, to relieve stress and anxiety or simply to pass the time – whether that’s with a regular partner or using hook-up apps.”
He added: “The reality is that, for the time being, you are your safest sexual partner.”
Have sex with your housemates or shack up with your partner during coronavirus lockdown.
The reassertion that your only sexual relationships should be with your housemates comes after the government suggested shacking up with a romantic partner.
England’s deputy chief medical officer Jenny Harries said on Tuesday: “If you are two individuals, two halves of the couple, currently in separate households, ideally they should stay in those households.
“The alternative might be that for quite a significant period going forward they should just test the strength of their relationship and decide whether one wishes to be permanently resident in another household, in which case all of the decisions about [household units] would apply.”
Despite the calls to self-isolate, hook-up apps have seen plenty of users during the lockdown – with Grindr among those to add warnings urging people to keep their distance and avoid touching faces – with the latter instruction likely making hook-ups a bit more of a challenge.
A Grindr spokesperson told PinkNews:”The health and safety of our users is a top priority for Grindr. We are advising users to follow guidelines provided by the WHO, and have published these guidelines in the Grindr app to help users make the best informed decisions when interacting with others.”
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