Michael
34 years
St. Petersburg
Michael works in a commercial area, contacts with a lot of people. He lives with his father, a disabled person. In 2002 Michael had a motoring accident, then had served time in prison.
He got infected sexually 2 years ago.
In prison, according to Michael, there was a special separate part where HIV-positive prisoners lived. They all got red tags. The writing on a swimming pool said: “Not for HIV-positives” and the therapy was absent.
Some time ago Michael faced the stigma for the first time: his father and he himself were rejected off the social service.
According to Michael, officers of the social security department explained it by saying that they could not endanger their employers because Michael had HIV.
“You know, it reminds me of something”, – he said after seeing white decorations for a portrait. “I’m going through barracks shortly before the release. I see a person underneath the same white sheet. I didn’t get at once that he was dead. He was HIV-positive and also had 2-3 days left before the release. Not a long time ago we had talked about what we’re going to do out of prison”.
