Financial Tips for Living with HIV

Originally Published by Healthy Black Men

Most of us don’t think about insurance until we need it and don’t have it.

Malcolm “MJ”  Harris is Managing Director of The Hurston Group, a national full services financial brokerage firm and he wants you covered.

“My role as a financial services professional is to help my clients plan for their future in a way that addresses their goals and budget. This includes helping them select life insurance, health insurance, and disability income insurance. Another major part of my work is helping clients make sure that they have enough money to retire.”

According to Mr. Harris, most people are under-insured for death and disability because people don’t think they can afford it or their health status disqualifies them. But life insurance can be as low as $30 a month, and can help cover final expenses and debt so that your loved ones won’t be burdened upon your death.

Disability insurance can replace up to 100% of your income for 90 days or until you are age 65 in most cases. Some life insurance plans also allow for income pay out if you become disabled.

Medical advances now allow many of us living with HIV positive to expect a longer life span. Now insurance and other financial companies are beginning to provide financial products to people living with HIV so that we can have the same financial protections as everyone else. Here are two financial products I recommend to most people living with HIV:

1. Get Life Insurance:When we pass away, we don’t want to leave our loved ones in a difficult financial position because we didn’t properly plan for our future. I recommend that every black gay man have life insurance if they:

• Have any joint debt (such as being a co-signer on a loan).
• Plan to leave their assets (such as their home) to someone when they die. For a $200,000 home, it can be as much as $6,000 to transfer the property to another person.
• Have at least $10,000 in life insurance to cover the cost of your funeral and final expenses.

2. Open a Guaranteed Income Retirement Account:The most common two concerns that I hear from my clients living with HIV are: “will I have enough money to retire and continue to meet my health care costs?”  and “how can I make sure that I don’t run out of money after I retire?” We offer guaranteed income retire accounts, which address both of these concerns. These accounts:

• Provide a guaranteed monthly or yearly payment to the client from the day that you retire until death.
• Can continue paying out money to a spouse or loved one even after death.

These account options can be important for people living with HIV because they provide an income source and help cover healthcare costs.

Malcolm “MJ”  Harris is Managing Director of The Hurston Group, a national full services financial brokerage firm that specializes in providing estate planning, life insurance, health insurance, and retirement planning. His team is a national leader in providing Chronic and Positive Financial Planning, a no-cost service designed to help chronically ill clients (including those who are HIV-positive) secure life and health insurance and plan for retirement.  

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HIV Treatment Works

Originally published by Healthy Black Men

It’s time to expand the HIV/AIDS fight from prevention to more about care, and living well. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently announced it’s first national communication campaign focused exclusively on encouraging treatment and care for people living with HIV.

The HIV Treatment Works campaign encourages people living with HIV to Get in Care, Stay in Care and Live Well. Here is an example.

According to the CDC, to protect your sexual partners, talk about your HIV status and take steps to protect your health and your partners’ health.

The following can reduce your risk of transmitting HIV:

• Use antiretroviral therapy (ART). ART reduces the amount of virus (viral load) in your blood and body fluids. ART can keep you healthy for many years, and greatly reduce your chance of transmitting HIV to sex partners if taken consistently and correctly.
• If you are taking ART, follow your health care provider’s advice. Visit your health care provider regularly and always take your medicine as directed.
• Choose less risky sexual behaviors. Oral sex is much less risky than anal or vaginal sex. Anal sex is the highest-risk sexual activity for HIV transmission. Sexual activities that do not involve the potential exchange of body fluids carry no risk for getting HIV (like touching).
• Use condoms consistently and correctly. When used correctly and consistently, condoms are highly effective in preventing HIV infection. Condoms are also effective at preventing sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) transmitted through body fluids, like gonorrhea, chlamydia, and HIV.
• Condoms provide less protection against STDs spread through skin-to-skin contact like human papilloma virus (HPV which cause genital warts), genital herpes, and syphilis.

The campaign features people living with HIV talking about how sticking with care and treatment helps them stay healthy and protect others. They also discuss some of the obstacles they have experienced getting into HIV care and staying on treatment and how they overcame these obstacles, offering valuable advice to others living with HIV.

Project Inform is a National HIV/AIDS Treatment Info-line offering confidential treatment information. Call 1-800-822-7422 toll free, Monday thru Thursday for more information.

Content for this article provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and AIDS.gov.

The Journey Back from 3 T Cells

Surviving and thriving with an HIV diagnosis takes more than medicine. Longtime Atlanta resident Dee Dee Chamblee is the perfect example of will, perseverance and self-esteem. She bounced back from drug use, sex work, jail time and living with only 3 T cells to a healthy, happy life and is the founder of LaGender, a prominent Atlanta transadvocacy group. Dee Dee was recently profiled by thebody.com as part of their This Positive Life series.

“I was diagnosed 25 years ago, in 1987. And it was during the time when I was expecting it,” Dee Dee begins. “There were people dying all around me. We couldn't even keep up with the people that were dead.”

“You know, it was like a Holocaust. And it was a tragedy. We had no counseling to get through it. And so, when I became positive, I kind of denied it, went into denial for, like, seven years. Did drugs, alcohol, prostituted, and did the whole realm. And, really, literally was trying to kill myself; because that's the way it seemed that the world wanted me to just disappear. Nobody wanted to look at me. People were very discriminatory towards transgenders, as far as getting jobs and stuff like that. So my only choice was to prostitute at that time.”

“Once I found out, and after the seven years of denial, I realized that I hadn't went nowhere. So I decided I better brush the dirt off of me and kick the flowers to the side -- that the funeral is not going to be held, it doesn't seem. So I got up and I started trying to find me a support group, someone that could help me love myself again.”

With the help of Common Ground, Dee Dee did survive and flourish. She now runs a support group for transgenders in the prison, counsels young people, and is an advocate for transgender rights in the city, among other things. “We have to build an exterior to be able to withstand what we have to go through,” she states.

Dee Dee offers this advice to others: “Go to the doctor. See about yourself. Love yourself. And start on a new path, with new boundaries that you set for yourself in your new life that you're starting to live. Don't look at it as a curse. Look at it as: It has opened your eyes that you should not live the way that you live in order to contract this disease, and that "I need to live a healthier lifestyle for myself, because I can today. Today I have more opportunities that I can go about it and do it the right way, and come out and be a success story."

HIV Patients Desire More Dialogue with Doctors

HIV patients on antiretroviral therapy are very involved in engaging with their healthcare providers in the management of their HIV a new survey shows. The results were published in the Wall Street Journal and noted that 300 people living with HIV were surveyed online from across the country and 97% said that they are proactive about managing their HIV condition, including drug treatment.

Three out of four participants did say they would like to spend more time discussing their concerns with their doctor – specifically HIV drug treatment and the impact of HIV on their lives. The survey also showed that most respondents were active about managing their HIV, from scheduling doctor appointments to discussing treatment options with their doctor and researching HIV topics.

“The results of this survey are very encouraging, however they underscore the need for more in-depth discussions between people living with HIV and their doctors - not only regarding their treatment regimens, but also how the disease is affecting their lives overall," said Dr. Michael Gottlieb, Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine, UCLA. "Communication between healthcare providers and patients is the cornerstone of developing and maintaining a successful HIV treatment plan."

Some of the topics patients would like to discuss include: how their current HIV drug treatment regimen is working, other HIV treatment options, health conditions other than HIV and side effects of their current HIV medicine.

People living with HIV and taking antiretroviral medications are encouraged to speak with their doctor about HIV and their concerns. Preparing topics and questions ahead of an appointment and prioritizing those questions can be useful tools to improve communication with your doctor.