Rio Calling is a six-part daily spin-off of HIV: The Morning After, broadcast from inside AIDS 2026 - the biggest HIV conference on the planet. Every day for six days, we're bringing you what's actually being said on the conference floor, what it means for people living with HIV, and how it lands against decades of lived experience from the podcast archive.

Please help to cover our costs! RIO CALLING Fundraising Link

Hosting duties fall to two Dans: Dan Hall, producer and presenter of HIV: The Morning After, and Dan Glass, ACT UP activist, author, and a man with infinite energy to make the world better. Together they unpack each day's theme, with clinical steer from Dr Tristan Barber of BHIVA. Wrapped around the raw interviews from the conference itself are clips from podcast guests including Jonathan Blake, Marc Thompson, Silvia Petretti, Ellie Harrison, Susan Cole-Haley, Angelina Namiba, Ellie Harrison and Alexander Cheves.

Please help to cover our costs! RIO CALLING Fundraising Link

Six days. Six themes. One conference deciding what happens next.

• Episode 1 - Money Talks: Funding cuts, PEPFAR, and what happens when the world stops paying attention.
• Episode 2 - Still Ashamed: Stigma hasn't gone anywhere — it's just moved to your dating apps and your GP's waiting room.
• Episode 3 - Whose Epidemic?: Migration, gender, and the voices the mainstream narrative keeps leaving out.
• Episode 4 - Undetectable, Not Untouched: The science has moved on. Has life?
• Episode 5 - Left Out of the Trial: Women, research gaps, and reproductive healthcare that's still catching up.
• Episode 6 - The Empty Room: What we lost when the community spaces closed - and what it costs to be surviving alone.

Subscribe in this feed now - new episodes land daily throughout AIDS 2026.

Please help to cover our costs! RIO CALLING Fundraising Link

Crowdfunder Link: RIO CALLING Fundraising Link

A Ukrainian DJ who started injecting heroin at 16 to help him sleep, survived six overdoses on the streets of Kyiv, and became one of Europe's most forceful voices for harm reduction and HIV treatment access - now fighting to keep supply chains open during a war.

Anton was born in Kyiv in 1986, just before the Soviet Union collapsed. His parents were public servants on small salaries, and while they worked to feed the family, the streets outside were filling with new substances flowing through newly opened borders. He started using drugs at 14. At 16, someone told him heroin would help him sleep between DJ sets. It did, briefly, and then it took over everything. For 11 years, Anton lived rough in Kyiv - sleeping in stairwells, dodging police who saw drug users as easy shakedown money, and surviving six overdoses.

The door opened through a harm reduction programme. Someone offered him a clean needle, asked if he wanted a sandwich, and didn't start with the word "drugs." That encounter led to an HIV and hepatitis C diagnosis - and to the realisation that he wanted to transform his experience into work.

Today, Anton is a founding member of the Ukrainian Network of People Who Use Drugs and one of the most prominent HIV and drug policy advocates in Eastern Europe. Since the full-scale Russian invasion in 2022, he and his peers have been using personal vehicles to transport HIV medications to regions where logistics companies refuse to go, and building online platforms so people can receive treatment by courier rather than attending destroyed clinics.

• [01:18] Born in Kyiv, 1986 - growing up in the post-Soviet wild west, where the Iron Curtain opened to new freedoms and new substances simultaneously
• [05:57] Heroin as a sleeping pill - starting at 16 to manage exhaustion from DJing, and the moment the body realised it liked the euphoria too
• [07:04] Harm reduction vs. abstinence - why the 12-step model didn't fit, and the science that says success doesn't always mean stopping
• [08:03] The first harm reduction visit - being asked how he felt and whether he wanted a coffee, not lectured about his drug use
• [10:17] Eleven years as an ordinary street junkie - Groundhog Day on the streets of Kyiv, locked out of his parents' home, jumping at every sound in stairwells
• [12:02] Police and corruption - drug users as the easiest source of money for officers and doctors, and the threat of withdrawal behind bars
• [14:11] The dual diagnosis - HIV and hepatitis C, a positive test received as a death sentence, and the perverse logic of using more because you're dying anyway
• [16:43] War and supply chains - how the 2014 Crimea annexation and then Covid prepared Ukraine's HIV community for the 2022 full-scale invasion
• [19:36] Medication by courier - dismantling the old model of clinic-based collection, and community members driving HIV treatment through war zones in their own cars
• [22:23] If Ukraine falls - what Russian occupation would mean for harm reduction, opioid therapy, and the LGBTQ community, and why Anton believes it won't happen

Anton remembers Egor, a childhood friend from the pioneer camps whose parents worked alongside his at the Ministry of Interior - one of the first people he lost to the heroin epidemic. He also remembers a brother and sister from his neighbourhood who both died of HIV-associated tuberculosis, leaving children behind.

Anton was born in Kyiv in 1986. He is a founding member of the Ukrainian Network of People Who Use Drugs and a leading HIV and drug policy advocate in Eastern Europe. He is a DJ and a father, and takes one pill every morning at nine o'clock. He is the podcast's first Ukrainian guest.

• Ukrainian Network of People Who Use Drugs
• Eurasian Harm Reduction Association
• Terrence Higgins Trust
• National AIDS Trust

If you have been affected by the themes in this episode, support is available at tht.org.uk.

Crowdfunder Link: RIO CALLING Fundraising Link

A young woman diagnosed with HIV at 21 in 2018 on her 1,199 days of silence, the book of lies she kept to track her cover stories, and why being called brave is part of the problem.

In the summer of 2018, Ellie Harrison was 21, working in London fashion, and ordered a routine STI test because she thought a break-up was coming. The clinic called it a false positive. It wasn't. She found out for certain on a Monday lunchtime, walking towards a Greggs in Birmingham, when 40 missed calls from an NHS number lit up her phone. She never made it to the sandwich.

What followed was 1,199 days - a number now tattooed on her arm - during which Ellie told fewer than ten people and kept a physical notebook of lies to remember which cover story she'd given for the daily tablet she took at lunch. She showered in water so hot it blistered her skin. She convinced herself she was the only woman in the world with HIV. When a boy she'd drunkenly told at a freshers' party spread her status across the university, it felt like the whole of Birmingham knew. Nobody came back with anything useful. They just said: that's really shit.

On World AIDS Day 2021, she filmed a video in her bedroom with a glass of wine, got too scared to post it, went out, got blackout drunk, asked a room full of people at an afterparty to watch it, and then put it on Facebook. By morning, her phone was unusable with notifications. She went on to work with the Terrence Higgins Trust and volunteer at the George House Trust in Manchester, where she met Paul Fairweather - the first person living with HIV she'd ever knowingly had a conversation with, four and a half years after her own diagnosis.

• [01:37] Summer 2018 - a routine STI test ordered as a precaution before an anticipated break-up, and the habit of regular testing that meant Ellie was checking for chlamydia, not HIV
• [04:28] The false positive - a clinic that reassured her it was probably a transport error, and the night out where she joked about her 30 seconds of fear
• [06:39] Walking towards a Greggs - 40 missed calls on a Monday lunchtime, the moment she didn't need the clinic to tell her what she already knew
• [08:12] "I didn't carry any of that knowledge with me" - taught about HIV at school, armed with none of it when it mattered. All she remembered was people dying in the 80s
• [10:04] The long corridor - the nurse who kept looking back to check she was still following, the refusal to sit down, and six panic attacks in the room where the words were finally said
• [13:42] Ringing mum and dad - parents hung over at an 80s festival in Levi's T-shirts, a mother who kept insisting it would be something else, and a three-hour drive to Birmingham
• [27:17] 1,199 days - the elapsed time between diagnosis and activism, the book of lies, and showering in boiling water because nobody said it would be okay
• [30:26] Freshers' week and the boy who told everyone - a drunken disclosure, a status shared across the university without consent, and the chaotic pub-to-pub mission to find out who knew what
• [36:03] The video, the wine, the afterparty - filming a disclosure video in her bedroom, being too scared to post it sober, and waking up to a phone full of missed calls that wasn't about a death
• [39:52] "Don't call me brave" - why Ellie believes the word reinforces the idea that HIV should be kept secret, and why talking about a thing that happened to her shouldn't require courage
• [41:53] The George House Trust and Paul Fairweather - volunteering before she'd ever accessed a service herself, and meeting the first person living with HIV she could sit across a table from

Ellie Harrison was diagnosed with HIV in August 2018 at 21. She is an HIV activist and peer mentor based in Manchester, working with the Terrence Higgins Trust and the George House Trust. She was inspired to speak publicly by the Gareth Thomas documentary, It's a Sin, and the work of Nathaniel Hall.

• Terrence Higgins Trust
• George House Trust — Manchester HIV support and services
• Positively UK — Peer support for people living with HIV
• National AIDS Trust
• The 2025–2030 UK HIV Action Plan

If you have been affected by the themes in this episode, support is available at tht.org.uk.

Crowdfunder Link: RIO CALLING Fundraising Link

A fashion industry hair and makeup artist who tested positive for HIV in 1985 and went three decades without medication - his body carrying a rare genetic mutation that science wouldn't fully explain for years.

Laurence Close grew up in Zambia, where being gay carried a prison sentence. He came to London in 1983, fell for a diplomat twenty years older, and trained as a hair and makeup artist while shuttling to Paris on weekends. When a bag from Yves Saint Laurent Beauté under the boyfriend's bed confirmed the affair, Laurence went to Gower Street for a test. He already knew.

The positive result arrived in 1985, five weeks late because of back-to-back photoshoots abroad. His first thought was not how to live but when to die - timed to look like an accidental overdose, because in his parents' farming community, that would be easier to explain than AIDS. A woman called Eunice, a Nigerian lesbian who had acquired HIV through rape, changed his mind in a waiting room at St Mary's Paddington by complimenting his coat.

For 30 years, Laurence's body did something his doctors couldn't explain. His viral load stayed undetectable and his CD4 count remained abnormally high - without a single day of medication. He carried a CCR5-Delta 32 gene mutation, inherited from one parent, that interfered with the virus's ability to enter his cells. Meanwhile, he built a career doing hair and makeup for Britney Spears, Tyra Banks, Annie Lennox, and Joan Collins, never blending foundation on the back of his hand again. He felt toxic. He chose partners who were, in his words, incredibly fucked up - people he couldn't shortchange by being with them.

When U=U reached him in 2016, the loaded gun he'd carried for three decades was finally empty. He married a Swedish man he'd spoken to for two years without seeing a photograph. This podcast is his public disclosure.

• [01:50] Zambia, boarding school, and sitting too close - growing up where homosexuality carries 14 years in prison, and the constant self-policing of gesture and gaze
• [05:08] London, 1983 - hairdressing school in Hammersmith, nights at Taboo and the Hippodrome, and a diplomat who showed him that gay men could go to the opera
• [10:53] The bag under the bed - discovering the affair in Paris, blaming himself, and deciding to get tested
• [16:21] The result, the calm, the calculation - receiving a positive diagnosis at 25 and planning suicide with the detachment of choosing when to swap summer tyres for winter
• [19:49] The fashion industry's decimation - Stevie Hughes, Dan Carrier, Luba Steubenville, and the weekly disappearances. A friend's father: "I wish you'd told me you had cancer, because then I could feel sorry for you"
• [24:29] Eunice at St Mary's - a woman in the Jeffreys Wing waiting room who complimented his coat and, without knowing it, gave him a reason to keep going
• [27:00] Disclosure in Hyde Park - why Laurence only ever told partners in places where they could leave without it being obvious, and the silence that followed
• [30:47] Feeling toxic - wanting love but building himself into an object of desire that would never let anyone close. "There's only so many times I can do that."
• [37:21] The body that wouldn't break - 5 years, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, and still no progression. The CCR5-Delta 32 gene mutation explained
• [40:55] The south of France and the lie - a partner who faked leukaemia to trap him, the domestic abuse that followed, and the client at the airport who said: "If you don't leave this man, he's going to kill you"
• [46:58] U=U and the end of the wolf - starting medication in 2016 after 31 years, and the moment the loaded gun became an empty chamber
• [51:23] The Swedish man - two years of conversation with no photograph, falling in love with how someone treats you, and marriage after 60

Laurence remembers Eunice, whose surname he never learned - the woman in the waiting room at St Mary's who made him decide to keep living.

Laurence Close is a hair and makeup artist who has worked in the fashion industry since the early 1980s. His clients have included Britney Spears, Tyra Banks, Annie Lennox, and Joan Collins. He carries a rare CCR5-Delta 32 gene mutation that slowed HIV progression for over three decades. He now lives in Sweden with his husband. This episode is his first public disclosure of his HIV status.

• Terrence Higgins Trust — Living with HIV long term
• National AIDS Trust
• The Survivors Trust — Domestic abuse support
• Galop — LGBT+ anti-abuse charity
• The 2025–2030 UK HIV Action Plan

If you have been affected by the themes in this episode, support is available at tht.org.uk.

Crowdfunder Link: RIO CALLING Fundraising Link

An American HIV journalist and long-term survivor reflects on four decades of living with HIV, from the pre-AIDS era of early 1980s West Hollywood to the age of Undetectable equals Untransmittable.

In 1980, Mark S King was a 19-year-old with a strawberry blonde fringe who won a car on The Price Is Right. His boyfriend Charlie was in the audience wearing a matching outfit. Five years later, a friend tested him for HIV after hours in a doctor's office - off the record, because a positive result could cost him his home and his job. The phone call that followed was brief: you're HIV positive, good luck, goodbye. No referral, no medication, no next steps. There was nothing to offer.

What followed was a decade spent in the thick of the West Hollywood AIDS crisis - running experimental drugs across the Mexican border, holding dying friends' hands through the Shanti Foundation, and finding moments of wilful joy on San Diego dance floors. Mark lost Ron at 26 in a Connecticut nursing home, Marcos to CMV blindness and suicide, and Lesley surrounded by friends singing him songs. When combination therapy arrived in 1996, the relief came tangled with guilt, confusion, and maxed-out credit cards. Forty years on, Mark sits on a porch in Atlanta with his husband Michael and calls happiness the only revolution he has left.

• [00:02] The strawberry blonde twink - Mark's childhood in Louisiana as an Air Force brat, finding role models in community theatre, and navigating desire in the Deep South
• [07:20] Winning a car on national television - the Price Is Right appearance in 1980, the matching outfits, and why Mark keeps returning to that footage as a snapshot of the "just before"
• [15:27] An encounter with Rock Hudson - a dinner in West Hollywood, an invitation back, and the world-weariness of a closeted star three years from dying on the nightly news
• [22:25] The envelope on the table - testing positive in 1985, the after-hours blood draw, and the two-week wait for a result that came with nothing attached
• [24:44] The Shanti Foundation and learning not to fix people - volunteering with the dying, the philosophy of compassionate presence, and the bank teller with Kaposi's sarcoma who just stopped showing up
• [30:36] Drug running to Tijuana - smuggling AZT across the border, packing it under the spare tyre, and dancing to Laura Branigan on the way home. Wilful joy.
• [35:49] Dick, Emile, and the brandy glass - Mark's brother and his partner's final act of love - assisted suicide.
• [41:11] The Lazarus effect - combination therapy arrives in 1996, and the impossible emotional whiplash of being told you might actually live
• [44:46] Long-term survivor as relic - why Mark resists being turned into a symbol, and why HIV remains the most fascinating societal mirror he knows
• [49:32] Joy as a mission statement - not bravado but disposition, and the message he would send back to the boy arriving in West Hollywood: trust your instincts

Mark remembers Antoine, a gender-fluid young Black man in gold lamé who died of AIDS only a few years ago - a reminder that the crisis is not history for everyone.

Mark S King is an American HIV journalist, essayist, and NLGJA LGBTQ Journalist of the Year. His memoir My Fabulous Disease: Chronicles of a Gay Survivor was published in 2024. He was inducted into the NLGJA Hall of Fame in 2025 and is a GLAAD Award winner. He lives in Atlanta with his husband Michael. His blog is My Fabulous Disease.

• My Fabulous Disease — Mark's blog and writing archive
• Terrence Higgins Trust — Long-term survivor support (UK)
• National AIDS Trust — HIV and the law in the UK
• The 2025–2030 UK HIV Action Plan

If you have been affected by the themes in this episode, support is available at tht.org.uk.

Crowdfunder Link: RIO CALLING Fundraising Link

A preview of the third series of HIV: The Morning After — ten new interviews with people living with HIV across four decades, five countries, and every assumption you thought you had.

Series 3 of HIV: The Morning After brings ten new voices to the podcast. An American journalist who smuggled AZT across the Mexican border in the boot of his car. A fashion makeup artist who lived with HIV for 30 years without a single day of medication, carrying a rare gene mutation his doctors couldn't explain. A young woman who kept a physical notebook of lies to remember which cover story she'd given for the pill she took at lunch. A Ukrainian DJ who survived six overdoses on the streets of Kyiv and now drives antiretroviral medication through a war zone in his own car. A Ugandan-born woman who packed six months of pills and flew home to die, arriving in the UK with a CD4 count of one. A man who survived a hijacked 747 at eleven and found clarity on a single dose of LSD taken for cluster headaches. A Nigerian priest who fasted for 40 days to pray the gay away, married a woman under church pressure, and founded Africa's first inclusive LGBTQ church across 22 countries. A Black British-Caribbean woman who told nobody for ten years and found her way back to her body through yoga and Buddhism. An HIV consultant who went from writing prescriptions to needing them, becoming the first person with HIV to lead the British HIV Association. And an actor who was diagnosed at 16, kept it secret for 15 years, and turned his story into a one-man show that led to 53 five-star reviews and a part in It's a Sin.

These are not cautionary tales. They are lives.

• Mark S King — HIV journalist and long-term survivor, diagnosed in 1985 in West Hollywood. Author of My Fabulous Disease.
• Laurence Close — Fashion hair and makeup artist, diagnosed in 1985. Lived 30 years without medication due to a rare CCR5-Delta 32 gene mutation. This episode is his first public disclosure.
• Ellie Harrison — Diagnosed at 21 in 2018. Spent 1,199 days in silence before going public on World AIDS Day 2021.
• Anton — Ukrainian DJ and harm reduction advocate, diagnosed in Kyiv. Founding member of the Ukrainian Network of People Who Use Drugs.
• Winnie Sseruma — Born in Sheffield, raised in Uganda, diagnosed in 1988 in the US. Co-founded the African HIV Policy Network. Arrived in the UK with a CD4 count of one.
• Hamish Noah — Born in Cambridge, raised across Southeast Asia and Africa. Diagnosed in January 2020. Recovery coach and HIV advocate.
• Reverend Jide Macaulay — Nigerian-born Anglican priest, diagnosed in 2003. Founder of the House of Rainbow, now operating in 22 countries.
• Louise Vallance — Black British-Caribbean woman, diagnosed in 2006 at 37. Told nobody for ten years. Yoga therapist and host of Aunty Lou's House.
• Dr Tristan Barber — HIV consultant at the Royal Free Hospital, diagnosed in 2002. First person living with HIV to chair the British HIV Association.
• Nathaniel Hall — Actor and activist from Stockport, diagnosed at 16 in 2003. Creator of First Time (53 five-star reviews) and cast member of It's a Sin.

• Terrence Higgins Trust
• National AIDS Trust
• Positively UK
• George House Trust — Manchester
• The 2025–2030 UK HIV Action Plan

New episodes released weekly. Subscribe on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen.

If you have been affected by the themes in this series, support is available at tht.org.uk.

Crowdfunder Link: RIO CALLING Fundraising Link

This is a special compilation episode featuring highlights from Series 1 and 2 of HIV: The Morning After, released ahead of Series 3 in June 2026.

This episode covers what that means to be here today. It covers learning to live with uncertainty as a medical instruction and a life philosophy. The specific weight of a 20-year prognosis delivered cheerfully, echoing in your head on the London Underground for days. The six months after a diagnosis so bleak and depressive that living and dying became things you could weigh against each other with complete neutrality - and the moment of choosing to live, not because it would be easy, but because there would also be great food, great sex and the possibility of wonder.

This episode also includes an exclusive clip from Series 3 featuring journalist Mark S King.

Resources

Terrence Higgins Trust - HIV information, support and campaigning www.tht.org.uk

NAM aidsmap - Clear, evidence-based information about HIV www.aidsmap.com

Positively UK - Peer support for people living with HIV in the UK www.positivelyuk.org

National AIDS Trust - Policy and advocacy www.nat.org.uk

Samaritans - Free, confidential support if you're struggling Call: 116 123 | www.samaritans.org

Links

Listen to the full episodes:

• Chris Smith — Series 2, Episode 1
• Matthew Hodson — Series 1, Episode 7
• Alexander Cheves — Series 2, Episode 2
• Diego Agurto Beroiza — Series 2, Episode 5
• Nikolaj Tange Lange — Series 2, Episode 9

Music by Paul Leonidou: www.unstoppablemonsters.com

Subscribe and listen on: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube

Crowdfunder Link: RIO CALLING Fundraising Link

This is a special compilation episode featuring highlights from Series 1 and 2 of HIV: The Morning After, released ahead of Series 3 in June 2026.

The epidemic had a story. A specific kind of story, told in a specific kind of voice - white, male, gay. It wasn't false. But it was one story, and it left a great many people out.

This episode covers what it costs to be absent from the dominant narrative: to be a Black woman told by her GP that HIV doesn't affect ladies like her; to grow up without seeing a single image of yourself in any HIV information; to spend years planning your funeral while your friends planned their weddings.

These are remarkable people. And the episode ends with a white, gay man whose activism is aimed very much at ensuring all voices are heard, not just those that look like him.

Resources

Terrence Higgins Trust - HIV information, support and campaigning www.tht.org.uk

NAM aidsmap - Clear, evidence-based information about HIV www.aidsmap.com

Positively UK - Peer support for people living with HIV in the UK www.positivelyuk.org

National AIDS Trust - Policy and advocacy www.nat.org.uk

Samaritans - Free, confidential support if you're struggling Call: 116 123 | www.samaritans.org

Links

Listen to the full episodes:

• Gus Cairns - Series 1, Episode 9
• Marc Thompson - Series 1, Episode 10
• Peter Willis - Series 1, Episode 8
• Martin Fenerty - Series 2, Episode 4

Music by Paul Leonidou: www.unstoppablemonsters.com

Subscribe and listen on: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTubeThis is a special compilation episode featuring highlights from Series 1 and 2 of HIV: The Morning After, released ahead of Series 3 in June 2026.

Resources

Terrence Higgins Trust - HIV information, support and campaigning www.tht.org.uk

NAM aidsmap - Clear, evidence-based information about HIV www.aidsmap.com

Positively UK - Peer support for people living with HIV in the UK www.positivelyuk.org

National AIDS Trust - Policy and advocacy www.nat.org.uk

Samaritans - Free, confidential support if you're struggling Call: 116 123 | www.samaritans.org

Links

Listen to the full episodes:

• Gus Cairns - Series 1, Episode 9
• Marc Thompson - Series 1, Episode 10
• Peter Willis - Series 1, Episode 8
• Martin Fenerty - Series 2, Episode 4

Music by Paul Leonidou: www.unstoppablemonsters.com

Subscribe and listen on: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube

Crowdfunder Link: RIO CALLING Fundraising Link

This is a special compilation episode featuring highlights from Series 1 and 2 of HIV: The Morning After, released ahead of Series 3 in June 2026.

What do you do when you were quietly certain you were going to die, and then you didn't? This episode is about the long aftermath of survival.

It covers what grief becomes when it stops being a storm and turns into ordinary weather: going to so many funerals you stop going. It covers the particular invisibility of being a young Black gay man in HIV services that hadn't imagined you existed. A GP treating dying patients while privately compartmentalising his own diagnosis. A decade spent keeping life deliberately small - no plans, no ambitions, nothing too far ahead - and the slow, confusing work of learning to want things again when the assumption of early death turned out to be wrong.

And everywhere, just beneath the surface, the people who were months too early for the drugs that would have saved them.

Resources

Terrence Higgins Trust - HIV information, support and campaigning www.tht.org.uk

NAM aidsmap - Clear, evidence-based information about HIV www.aidsmap.com

Positively UK - Peer support for people living with HIV in the UK www.positivelyuk.org

National AIDS Trust - Policy and advocacy www.nat.org.uk

Samaritans - Free, confidential support if you're struggling Call: 116 123 | www.samaritans.org

Links

Listen to the full episodes:

• Gus Cairns - Series 1, Episode 9
• Marc Thompson - Series 1, Episode 10
• Peter Willis - Series 1, Episode 8
• Martin Fenerty - Series 2, Episode 4

Music by Paul Leonidou: www.unstoppablemonsters.com

Subscribe and listen on: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube

Crowdfunder Link: RIO CALLING Fundraising Link

This is a special compilation episode featuring highlights from Series 1 and 2 of HIV: The Morning After, released ahead of Series 3 in June 2026.

What did HIV do to four people across four different decades, and what effect was left when the acute crisis passed?

Seven and a half stone in an ambulance. A bruise on a chest that didn't go away. Retiring on the basis of six months to live and then watching six months keep getting longer. Seven pills before school, wrapped in tin foil at house parties and smuggled to a toilet cubicle so no one would see.

And what it means to have never known life without HIV: no before, no after, just the continuous fact of it, and the pills that became, in their own way, a form of certainty when everything else felt out of control.

Resources

Terrence Higgins Trust - HIV information, support and campaigning www.tht.org.uk

NAM aidsmap - Clear, evidence-based information about HIV www.aidsmap.com

Positively UK - Peer support for people living with HIV in the UK www.positivelyuk.org

National AIDS Trust - Policy and advocacy www.nat.org.uk

Samaritans - Free, confidential support if you're struggling Call: 116 123 | www.samaritans.org

Links

Listen to the full episodes:

• Anthony Bird — Series 1, Episode 6
• Garry Brough — Series 2, Episode 4
• Peter Willis — Series 1, Episode 8
• Eli Fitzgerald — Series 2, Episode 7

Music by Paul Leonidou: www.unstoppablemonsters.com

Subscribe and listen on: Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube