An 83-year-old retired GP who treated patients and friends during the epidemic while quietly assuming he was positive himself, lost his partner Malcolm to HIV, and told him at the end: it's all right, love - you can go.

Summary

Peter Willis is 83, a retired GP who brings a dual perspective to HIV: doctor and patient, clinician and bereaved partner. During the height of the epidemic, he was treating patients and friends while living with the private assumption that he too was positive - long before his actual diagnosis confirmed it.

His partner Malcolm was a theatre director with his own company, an intensely critical scholar from a working class background, and the only person in his school ever to have taken an O-level. They were together for sixteen years. When Malcolm was dying of pleurisy, Peter lay in bed beside him. His two nephews - young men on their way to a ferry for a European holiday - drove down from Northampton in the middle of the night to stand silently by the bedside. Peter leaned in and whispered: it's all right, love. You can go. I'll be all right without you. Malcolm stopped trying to breathe.

The funeral was standing room only. The organist managed to play Somewhere on the oldest organ in London. As Peter walked past the churchwarden, she said: I've never heard anything so wonderful about love. He is very proud of that.

Three decades later, Peter lives with his Japanese partner. He has discovered pottery, navigates a handful of pills twice a day, and considers U=U one of the most wonderful developments in the history of the virus.

Key Moments

• [00:01] "I've never heard anything so wonderful about love" - the churchwarden's words after Malcolm's funeral
• [02:02] Dual perspective - treating patients and friends during the epidemic while quietly assuming he was positive himself
• [17:50] Ageing with HIV - what the health and social care systems need to provide, and the reliance on people who do far more than they're rewarded for
• [19:43] U=U - an absolutely wonderful development that removed the fear from relationships
• [20:25] Malcolm - a theatre director, a scholar, intensely critical, who played Rothko while dying and whose students still won't take a job without wondering whether he'd approve
• [23:13] "You can go" - lying in bed with Malcolm, whispering permission to stop fighting, and the moment he stopped trying to breathe
• [24:13] The oldest organ in London - Somewhere played at the funeral, nephews who drove through the night, and standing room only

Dedication

Peter remembers Malcolm, his partner of sixteen years - a theatre director, a self-educated scholar, an intensely critical man who played Rothko while dying and whose last role was the one he was most proud of.

About Peter Willis

Peter Willis is an 83-year-old retired GP who treated patients and friends during the height of the HIV epidemic. He lost his partner Malcolm to HIV and has lived with the virus himself for decades. He now lives with his Japanese partner of nearly 30 years and has taken up pottery.

Resources

• Terrence Higgins Trust
• National AIDS Trust

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