USSR's first HIV-positive man still enjoys life at the age 53

- The penitentiary administration expected that prisoners would have a lynch law on me and kill my by burning. But in the prison I stayed together with inmates  whom I managed to establish quite normal relations with. When the plans of the administration failed they put me into a solitary cell where I spent three years and seven months. That was a horrible and dirty place. Security gave me newspapers and magazines but never took them back, obviously they were afraid of catching the infection through ordinary everyday contacts. I even had to go on a hunger strike to have better conditions. My hunger strike of 17 days made the prison administration put me into a hospital for prisoners. Two days before the term of my imprisonment elapsed I was told that I was amnestied.

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- How did you choose where to go after you were released?

- I had some friends in St.Petersburg, I loved the city and went there. My friends worked at a public international AIDS organization, and I began working there too. When the project ended in 1996 we registered the Society of HIV-positive and AIDS patients where we currently study the plague of the 21st century and make people understand that HIV-positive people do not deserve negative treatment which they usually receive in the society. These people suffer from awful discrimination, I know. Today, there are 35,000 officially registered HIV-positive people in St.Petersburg. Many people got HIV-infected in 2000-2001 which means these people will feel unwell in another 5-6 years.

- Do you personally work with every patient staying at the Society?

- I have to do any work at the society because we have just five people of staff. It is a real problem today to employ people adequately treating the AIDS problem; unfortunately we cannot offer high wages, and what is more working here we have to face death and sufferings which is a distressing sight for many people.

- How do you stand sufferings of your patients yourself?

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