WHEN YOUNG DR. ANDREW FAULK first learned he was HIV-positive, he was devastated for it certainly meant imminent death. Until then, he'd been an outstanding young physician with years of intensive training. That day, facing the great divide of his life, he considered abandoning his medical career. But seeing the staggering needs of the gay community, he dedicated the remainder of his life to to the fight against AIDS. Ultimately, Faulk participated in the care of approximately 50 patients who died, many his own peers, including his partner.
Being HIV-positive, Faulk discovered something other doctors didn't experience—in every patient he cared for, whatever the symptoms, he saw himself. As patients and friends died around him, at any time he, too, could have "stepped off the earth." Yet with intuition, insight and compassion, he brought peace and comfort whenever possible to those under his care. Now, after years of silence about his painful past, Faulk recounts those horrific years of despair and heroism and tells this, his true story as doctor, patient and survivor.
A new epilogue in this second edition compares Covid-19 with HIV and examines the problems with the American healthcare system that predisposed the U.S. to the tragedy of the Covid-19 pandemic.