Interview: Jay Laudato
Interview with Jay Laudato, former Executive Director of Callen-Lorde Community Health Center
You’ve been working in AIDS healthcare for over 25 years, right?
Yes. I left Legal Aid in 1988 to work at GMHC, where I helped people living with AIDS secure financial and health benefits and met my husband Tom. Then, I moved to the public hospital system, where I provided support and oversight of AIDS services at 11 public hospitals, two nursing homes and six large, free-standing clinics. From then on, I’ve been at Callen-Lorde, with a break to work with the NYS Health Department, where I oversaw many of the programs that support people with HIV. To this day, with almost 4,000 HIV patients in care, Callen-Lorde remains the largest HIV practice of any non-hospital program in New York State.
Tell us a little about Callen-Lorde.
Our roots go back more than 40 years, to St. Marks Community Clinic and Gay Men’s Health Project. In those days, we provided free STD care for gay men who were too afraid or ashamed to seek treatment elsewhere. In 1983, as the AIDS epidemic emerged, the two groups merged to become Community Health Project, which was housed at the Center for many years. We worked with the City to secure the first funding ever to address HIV care specially for gay men – a grant from the Robert Wood-Johnson Foundation – and the first funding for a free-standing HIV clinic outside a hospital setting. In 1999, after having operated under Bellevue Hospital’s license, we got our own and renamed the organization Callen-Lorde, after Michael Callen and Audrey Lorde. Every day, the first thing I see when I walk into the door is a quote from Michael, “We must fix our hearts and minds on a clear image of a day when AIDS is no more. Make no mistake that day will come.”
Callen-Lorde provides health care and wellness services to a diverse array of over 15,000 LGBT people, regardless of their ability to pay.
How has Callen-Lorde’s HIV work changed over the years?
The evolution of medicine for HIV treatment has been dramatic. Many patients are now well managed by taking one pill a day. However, the stigma of HIV still keeps many away from care, in particular young gay men, people of color and older men with substance abuse or mental health issues. HIV has always been a tragedy, but now it’s an even greater tragedy with all these treatments unable to reach people. Places of safety like Callen-Lorde are so important, as it is no longer about the medicine, but the engagement of vulnerable people with HIV, as well as those at high risk. Some patients are still shocked to learn they have HIV, despite knowing all the risk factors. HIV has affected so many communities, of course, but it has deeply affected gay men, who are again the most likely population to become infected with HIV. There is still so much fear, shame and stigma associated with HIV, even as we enter the age of PrEP.
What do you think about the Memorial?
I think the Memorial will serve as a focal point for people to both honor what’s happened and recognize that it’s not over. We need these tangible symbols to bring it back to our consciousness, because, as I said, it’s far from over. I hear some people say, “We didn’t build a WWII memorial until the war was over,” but with AIDS it’s different. We have to memorialize this for us to solve it.