OHMYGOSSIP — Nathaniel Hall says appearing in ‘It’s A Sin’ made him realise just how “lucky” he was to be diagnosed with HIV when medication was available.
The 34-year-old actor – who plays Donald Bassett, the boyfriend of Olly Alexander’s character Ritchie Tozer in the Channel 4 drama – recently admitted he contracted HIV the first time he had sex, when he was 16 years old, and he was given a prognosis of 37 years.
But thanks to medicine, Nathaniel – who met his boyfriend Sean, who is HIV-negative, during lockdown – cannot pass the virus on, and he thinks it is “phenomenal” how far HIV medication has progressed, admitting his life could’ve been “very different” if he had been born earlier.
He said: “I actually found lockdown love. Me and Sean met during the lockdown.
“I’m on medication and my viral load is what’s known as undetectable. That means I can’t transmit the virus on.
“My partner Sean remains HIV-negative and he also takes HIV medication, which can help him from pre-emptively getting HIV.
“If you had said to me at 16 that that was going to be the case when I was in my 30s I wouldn’t have believed you.
“So, it’s phenomenal how far we’ve come.
“I think doing the show, what sat really heavy with me was just how lucky I was.
“I was diagnosed about seven years into effective medication, so I look at some of the characters in the show and think, ‘Gosh, if I had been born a few years earlier my life could’ve been very, very different.’ “In ‘It’s A Sin’ – which was created by Russell T Davies – a number of characters die from Aids after contracting HIV in the 1980s. 
Nathaniel admitted he carried “a lot of shame” after he was diagnosed with HIV, and it took him 15 years to tell his family, despite having a “really good relationship” with them.
Asked how it was knowing he had HIV but not telling anyone, he told ‘Lorraine’: “I’ve got a really good relationship with my family. I came out at 16 as gay, and they’ve been very supportive.
“I think what that demonstrates to people is the power of the shame and the stigma surrounding HIV.
“It’s probably the most stigmatised disease in the world.
“Even though we’re really close, I just really struggled to say this thing.
“There was a lot of shame I was carrying. It took me 15 years for me to realise the diagnosis was really impacting my mental wellbeing.
“It was at that point I decided I wanted to tell my family.”

Source: VacationHunter.Online
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