FOR LGBTQ PEOPLE STRUGGLING
WITH COVID, HIV/AIDS
EPIDEMIC CASTS ITS SHADOW Brian Sullivan
“This wine tastes funny,” he said. Joel Mosby, 42, of Memphis, was home with his husband Luke, 32, trying to enjoy a glass of white wine on St. Patrick’s Day when he noticed something was off. “I mentioned it to Luke, and we just thought it was weird,” Mosby said. “We finished our wine and went to bed.” The next day, on March 18, Mosby would wake up with what felt like a frontal lobe sinus headache. His head and teeth ached. “It felt like a hangover, like a dehydration headache, then diarrhea,” Mosby said. “The next few days, I developed body aches, chills and constant fatigue. I kept all of those symptoms for almost a month.” A couple weeks after testing positive for coronavirus, Mosby said he received a call from the Shelby County Health Department telling him his contagion period had ended, giving him the clear to end his self-quarantine. Mosby said different Baptist Hospital representatives called him throughout the process to make sure he knew his test had come back positive.
10
July 2020
o u t a n d a b o u t n a s hv i l l e .c o m
Mosby said someone called to ask him about donating plasma because he possibly had antibodies that could help combat the virus, but Mosby informed them that, while he was more than willing to donate, he was gay. He said he never heard back from them after that. For decades, the FDA has restricted men who have had sex with men in the past year from donating blood, but the agency loosened its rules on April 2 to help address the coronavirus outbreak. The rules now allow men to donate who have not had sex with men in the past three months. “Going through this is an uncomfortable, uncommon experience, but it woke me up,” Mosby said. “I’m HIV-, but I’ve never been as close to that feeling someone must have had back then. I’ve watched plenty of movies and I’ve considered myself very aware of gay history and experiences, but it was devastating to go through something similar to what they must have went through. Feeling sick and not knowing anything about the illness you have, while being stigmatized. It’s very sad and eye opening.” Mosby began slowly journeying out, and traveled to his neighborhood grocery store on April 11, mask and gloves in
