Rory O'Neill, AKA Panti Bliss, appeared on Ireland AM to discuss having HIV and the importance of te

Wednesday 4th, 16:05pm

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Sharon McHugh
TV3 PRESS OFFICE
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Ciara Byrne
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IMMEDIATE: Wednesday 4th June, 2014.

Rory O'Neill, AKA Panti Bliss, appeared on Ireland AM to discuss having HIV and the importance of testing.

Entertainer and gay rights activist Rory O'Neill, AKA Panti Bliss, appeared on Ireland AM this morning to speak about fronting a campaign ‘Know The Score: Get Tested’, to encourage gay and bi-sexual men to get tested for HIV.

Alongside Sexual Health Expert Dr. Shay Keating, Rory discussed his own experience with being diagnosed with HIV and why it is so important for gay and bi-sexual men to get tested.

Rory told Sinead Desmond and Anton Savage that although the virus does not affect his health a huge amount, it does affect his relationships and there is still a huge stigma surrounding HIV in Ireland.

To watch the full interview click here.

Ireland AM airs Monday to Friday from 7am – 10.00am on TV3.

Entertainer and gay rights activist Rory O'Neill AKA Panti Bliss appeared on Ireland AM this morning to speak about fronting a campaign called ‘Know The Score: Get Tested’, to encourage gay and bi-sexual men to get tested for HIV. Rory feels that although there is a lot of information in the public domain, there is still a stigma around HIV in Ireland and he made reference to the mass grave found on the grounds of a former children’s home in Galway.

“There’s still this sort of shaming about it and this undercurrent of ‘you should have known better, in a way you kind of deserve it.’ I’m not here to have that sort of moral argument today but all that stuff is just bull. I mean we shame people for their sexual choices in this country for generations and where did we end up with that, you know water tanks full of dead babies.”

Speaking about being diagnosed in 1995, Rory described it as being like he was put on a conveyor belt that would end in a funeral. He did not have any symptoms and only went to see a doctor for a general check-up.

“I mean what I remember most of that diagnosis is my doctor, I felt so sorry for him because he was delivering a death sentence to someone in their 20’s and I really felt for him. It was hard but I was very lucky because within a couple of years, the new treatments, the antiretroviral treatments started to come on stream so I was never...you know when I was first diagnosed, yes it was very grim going to the clinic and people were sick and dying but very quickly that all started to change so there was always this progress of things getting better, to the stage where now it’s very much a treatable chronic condition.”

Rory explained that he only ever thinks about having HIV when it is the topic of conversation as he takes his medication everyday on auto-pilot and only has to visit a clinic four times a year however it does affect him and his relationships.

“I don’t want to downplay it. It’s a huge pain in the neck but the truth is, I’m healthy and it’s manageable and like most people today who are on treatment, I’m what’s called undetectable. They can’t actually find the virus so for example, I wouldn’t be infectious per se.

“I’m single and every now and then I bizarrely find someone who might want to date me and I have a three date rule. There’s no point in telling someone straight up the first date because they don’t even know you and it’s too easy for them to just you know, whatever so I have a three date rule. Everybody has a different one and on the third date, I then tell them. It’s an annoying conversation.”

When Sexual Health Expert Dr. Shay Keating shared the shocking statistic that 80 per cent of men who have sex with men do not believe that they are a risk, Rory explained that a lot of this is to do with feeling invincible when you’re young.

“If you are 22, 23 now, you did not grow up with those ads on the TV and to you it’s the sort of vague, far away thing that maybe older gays have to worry about and every 23-year-old feels invincible anyway and that nothing will ever happen to them but they honestly feel that this doesn’t even impinge on their life and that is partly to do with the stigma too.

“When you’re 23 and especially when you’ve had a few drinks on you, you make bad choices. There was a time in this country when being a young woman and being pregnant out of wedlock was worse than this diagnosis and did that stop hundreds of thousands of girls getting pregnant? No because your biological drive to have sex is stronger.”

For further information on HIV and free testing, visit:

www.man2man.ie and

www.dublinaidsalliance.ie

Ireland AM airs Monday to Friday from 7am – 10.00am on TV3.

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Sharon McHugh – Head of Press & Publicity – 087 922 4143

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