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| Antonio Cox |
This story came from chasing a bogus New York Post story about armies of homeless people living at O'Hare airport. It turned out they weren't there — just another sensational, make-Chicago-look-like-a-hellhole exaggeration. But in establishing that, I reached out to Heartland, and while I had them on the line, I pointed out that the paper would love to do something about the work that they do...
Antonio Cox is not ashamed. He doesn’t mind if you know his full name, see his photo, are aware he was homeless on the streets of Chicago and slept in Grant Park. Nor is his medical status a secret.
“Four or five years ago, I got really sick and got diagnosed with HIV,” he says. “The doctor was really scary: You might die, your medications might not work.”
But drugs to keep HIV infection from manifesting itself into AIDS do work, astoundingly well, although they have a nettlesome requirement common to medications: You have to take them.
Which can be a challenge even for those who have jobs and homes and ordered lives. For those on the street or unemployed or coping with mental illness, remembering to take their medicine can be a challenge. That’s where organizations like Heartland, which introduced me to Cox, are important. We met in their Uptown clinic, on Lawrence Avenue.
Some 20,000 Chicagoans live with HIV, according to the Chicago Department of Health. About two-thirds have what is known as “viral suppression,” meaning there is no detectable virus in their bodies.
To achieve this, Cox takes just a single pill a day — Triumeq. Not too long ago Cox would have to take up to 18 pills a day.
“It’s always changing,” said Dr. Firas Mahdi, senior manager of clinical operations at Heartland. “It changed five years ago when they started to produce one pill with three medications combined; it was easier for everyone.”
My view of HIV was formed in the 1980s, when AIDS was a death sentence, and for that reason I imagined just knowing you have HIV, even under control, would be a burden. Cox, 34, doesn’t view it that way at all.
“I’m glad I got HIV,” he said, contrasting his former life with his family in Palatine with now, enfolded in the embrace of social services. “I’ve been surrounded by these angels, I got an apartment during the pandemic. I’ve gotten the best care, I have beautiful teeth because of their dentist. I could go on and on. I could care less that I have HIV, the only thing that I care about is that I’ve been among these beautiful people. Most of the time I forget I have HIV.”
Antonio Cox is not ashamed. He doesn’t mind if you know his full name, see his photo, are aware he was homeless on the streets of Chicago and slept in Grant Park. Nor is his medical status a secret.
“Four or five years ago, I got really sick and got diagnosed with HIV,” he says. “The doctor was really scary: You might die, your medications might not work.”
But drugs to keep HIV infection from manifesting itself into AIDS do work, astoundingly well, although they have a nettlesome requirement common to medications: You have to take them.
Which can be a challenge even for those who have jobs and homes and ordered lives. For those on the street or unemployed or coping with mental illness, remembering to take their medicine can be a challenge. That’s where organizations like Heartland, which introduced me to Cox, are important. We met in their Uptown clinic, on Lawrence Avenue.
Some 20,000 Chicagoans live with HIV, according to the Chicago Department of Health. About two-thirds have what is known as “viral suppression,” meaning there is no detectable virus in their bodies.
To achieve this, Cox takes just a single pill a day — Triumeq. Not too long ago Cox would have to take up to 18 pills a day.
“It’s always changing,” said Dr. Firas Mahdi, senior manager of clinical operations at Heartland. “It changed five years ago when they started to produce one pill with three medications combined; it was easier for everyone.”
My view of HIV was formed in the 1980s, when AIDS was a death sentence, and for that reason I imagined just knowing you have HIV, even under control, would be a burden. Cox, 34, doesn’t view it that way at all.
“I’m glad I got HIV,” he said, contrasting his former life with his family in Palatine with now, enfolded in the embrace of social services. “I’ve been surrounded by these angels, I got an apartment during the pandemic. I’ve gotten the best care, I have beautiful teeth because of their dentist. I could go on and on. I could care less that I have HIV, the only thing that I care about is that I’ve been among these beautiful people. Most of the time I forget I have HIV.”
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Beautiful. And now I’m aware of another worthy agency. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteThe combination of mental illness, poverty and being unhoused, must be brutal. Add in a serious stigmatized illness and it must be tough to have a positive outlook like Mr. Cox
ReplyDeleteI'm grateful that there are service agencies for people who find themselves in this predicament. I know there are too many people struggling for all of them to be helped.
Even though Mr. Cox is open about his identity and his circumstance, it seems to do him and other transgendered people a disservice to pass along the information that he wants to transition so that he can be a hot babe, with black lipstick in knee high platform shoes.
This is certainly not why most people transition. To up their game if you will