What the lovely Netflix show Merlí gets right about HIV and young men - Queerty

With World AIDS Day approaching December 1, the good news is the miracle of anti-viral treatments and PrEP means fewer people are contracting HIV or dying from the disease.

Just as he’s coming to terms with his attraction to men, he learns from a one-night stand that he was exposed to HIV, a year and a half after the fact.

He’s certain he’s unaffected: He’s basically straight and a top with other men, and out of reach of a “gay plague.”.

Spoiler Alert: A pharmacia test reveals he’s positive, a nightmare scenario for the machismo golden boy, who’s all but certain the result is a death sentence.

It also affects his relationship with an older handsome man he’s falling in love with: How can anyone trust him after he put himself in danger

The theme to this year’s World AIDS Day, “Putting Ourselves to the Test: Achieving Equity to End HIV,” is a reminder we all have a responsibility to help eliminate the disparities and inequities that create barriers to HIV testing, prevention, and access to HIV care, and to make HIV a thing to be memorialized