Rafael George: I was born with HIV, I felt that people didn’t want me

The doctors considered me a “finished case” in a rare, shocking interview by Rafael George, brother of Andreas George and director of photography in the Famagusta series. The 32-year-old photographer was born with the virus and talks about the difficult years. Rafael George spoke to Down Town Cyprus about the important role his grandmother played in his life and as he says if it wasn’t for her, maybe today he wouldn’t be alive. Because thanks to her he always took his HIV pills. How were your childhood when you were growing up with your family in Saint Napa and Paralimni? It was hard. For psychological reasons, for reasons of rejection, for a lot. Rejected, why? Because of my illness, as a carrier of the HIV virus I was from, from which my mother eventually died and, several years later, and my father. People were scared. We are talking about another era, of course, of poor – or wrong – information about the virus, of rumors that made the lives of patients difficult – I do not blame anyone. But I was a child! I was born with it. And I felt like people didn’t want me. Some people were even afraid to come near me. But I found the power and moved on. And I’m here. Since you were a child, were you given drugs? Yeah. And that’s always been the big fight with my grandmother, who raised me. Because they were strong drugs and tasted terrible. But my grandmother was always there: Pushing me, along with my food, taking my meds, with my watch in my hand, so I wouldn’t lose a minute since I had to take my meds. If it wasn’t for my grandmother to do this, I would definitely not live! Was there a danger when you were born that you wouldn’t survive? When I was born, I had been through bronchopneumonia. And in combination with the virus that I was born with, the doctors considered me a “finished case”, but—in some magical way, my grandmother attributed it to a miracle—I overcame the risk. The doctors were saying, at first, to my grandmother that “by his four he will live”, then he became “by his five”, then “by his seven”, but in the meantime science went on and made leaps in what was involved in HIV – I came to be 32 years old today, to have made my children healthy, and the virus is now undetectable in my system, so it is not contagious.