Medications are keeping me alive

I respond to the Tuesday letter “Will deaths rise under new coverage?” from Dr. Michael Para. I have been living with AIDS for more than 20 years. When I was diagnosed in 1995 at the age of 30, I was given one to three years to live.

I was devastated when I received my prognosis, because people were dying of AIDS often in the 1980s, because of lack of knowledge about AIDS and few medications being available at that time.

As the years have gone by, more is known about HIV/ AIDS and there are more medications available to keep people alive longer. I am an example that staying in care and taking medications can keep one alive much longer these days.

Surviving AIDS through medications has allowed me to have a son and watch him grow into a young man.

Prayerfully, I will be able to continue affording my medications or I will most certainly die soon after losing access.

David Baker II Galloway Merrick Garland’s nomination by President Barack Obama.”

When did it become a constitutional duty to hold hearings? In 2005, when the Democrats sought to delay a Bush Supreme Court nominee’s appointment, Harry Reid famously said that the duties of the United States Senate are set forth in the Constitution of the United States. Nowhere in that document does it say the Senate has a duty to give presidential nominees “an up or down vote.”

It says appointments shall be made with the advice and consent of the Senate. That is very different from saying that every nominee receives a vote. So, is Tripp suggesting that there is one set of rules for Democrats and another for Republicans? Maybe this invidious attitude is why we have a divided country.

Tim Thurston Columbus