How AIDS changed the world
The commemorative event on World AIDS Day in Frankfurt’s Katharinenkirche is about the beginnings of the disease and the changed sexuality.
HIV, the “Human Immunodeficiency Virus”, has lost its great horror. However, the virus, which can lead to AIDS (acquired immune deficiency syndrome) if left untreated, is still present. 86 people died of AIDS in Frankfurt last year. Yesterday, World AIDS Day, she and all the others who died as a result were remembered. So far there are more than 36 million people worldwide.
At the commemoration event in the Katharinenkirche, Frankfurt’s health department head Stefan Majer (Greens) recalled that many more people had suffered in the context of HIV. The beginnings of the disease in the 1980s were threatening. Not just because of the virus and AIDS itself, but also because of politics and crude ideas. Because it was again considered to block homosexuals in the camp.
In their conversation, AIDS activist Christian Setzepfandt and sexologist Martin Dannecker also recalled the past 40 years with the virus. Whereby, Dannecker immediately corrected it, 40 years ago the term HIV didn’t even exist. It started out as the Grid – Gay Related Immune Deficiency and was immediately closely associated with gay men. Even when the term AIDS was unified in 1982, the term was “never neutral”, as Setzepfandt explains.
Both remember how in 1985 the peak of the AIDS crisis reached the war. “There was collective hysteria and colossal fear,” Dannecker said. Straight people, who were initially at low risk and had little to fear, were the most concerned. “People thought that if you didn’t bring gay people to their senses, the world would end,” says the sex researcher. Also in 1985 there was the first test for detection, which was wrongly called AIDS test, although it only detected the virus. Dannecker said in no uncertain terms that one should not be tested. “Medicine had nothing to offer, and if there was a diagnosis, there wasn’t even a consultation.” The arguments that people who knew they were positive would be kinder were untenable.
In the same year, the Aidshilfe Frankfurt was founded. AIDS organizations have existed in Germany since 1983. They were a crucial link between politics and the community as there was a great distrust of the state.
But AIDS also changes sexuality. At that time she was characterized by fear and even hostility to her body (no French kisses), said Dannecker. And even today, when you have sex, you think about the consequences. Health and maintaining it has become a part of sexuality. Regrettable, as Sitzepfandt thought.