A Quote by Leonardo DiCaprio
Mozambique is having an economic resurgence but still four out of 10 people there have HIV or AIDS...There's astounding conditions but what I was left with...was the power of the human spirit there and the fact these people have been through so much and they were still dancing in the streets
Quote Topics
Quote Author
Related Quotes
Some countries that I go to are still trying to deny that it's happening. In India, 2.1 million people are living with HIV AIDS. India manufactures most of the drugs that are used to cure HIV around the world, which is an amazing, amazing fact that most people don't know.
The greatest testimony to the human spirit that I'm witnessing now is the fact that people still come back to work, after all that has been done to them. They are still willing to participate for a more positive future if they would be sincerely invited.
There's so much stigma around HIV/AIDS. It's a challenging issue, and the people that already have been tested and know their status find it very, very hard to disclose their status, to live with that virus, and to even seek out the kind of information they need. This experience of going to South Africa a decade ago really woke me up to the scale of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in sub-Saharan Africa, how it was affecting women and their children. I haven't been able to walk away from it.
I burned out on AIDS and did no AIDS work for a couple of years. I was so angry that people were still getting this disease that nobody can give you - you have to go out and get it!
More people with HIV/Aids are getting inexpensive anti-retroviral drugs, and their life expectancy has increased, but universal access is still far off, and the disease is still spreading, if more slowly than before.
The tragedy of civil wars in countries like Angola and Mozambique is that they left many civilians maimed. Poverty is the reason HIV/AIDS spread so rapidly in the African townships and slums. Poverty is the real killer.
To tell you the truth, I'm shocked, as I travel across this country, at how little people know or don't want to know about HIV/AIDS. There are a lot of people who don't know that HIV is one thing and AIDS is another. Those people just think it's one big old alphabet of a disease.
There's still people that do it poorly... and people that do it very, very well. I think there's still an incredible spectrum. I guess there's something that's appealing in it, in that everyone on some level is a DJ. But people still go to clubs, and there's still... it is interesting - with everyone having an iPod now - when music is so personalised and things like Pandora and making your own playlists, there's something really powerful about a room full of people all dancing to the same song.
Now you are changed people. Your personality is different. It's shining through your spirit. In that spirit, you have to see everything. All your conditionings will drop out as soon as you start identifying your Self fully, fully with the spirit. Fully - again I say because we do not. We are still Christians. We are still Hindus. We are still Muslims. We are still Indians, English, this, that. We are still narrow-minded, small, little puddles. We have to be the ocean. Once you are identified with the ocean, you have to throw away everything and become absolutely clean and detached.
The stigma, the fact that nobody was talking about AIDS was arguably killing more people than the virus itself. So I did an ad about the fact that nobody was speaking about HIV/AIDS.
My mother died yesterday, yesterday many years ago. You know, what amazed me the most the next day after her leaving was the fact that the buildings were still in place, the streets were still full of cars running, full of people who were walking, seemingly ignoring that my whole world has just disappeared." (rough translation)
It's important not to lose sight of the fact people of all sorts are still putting themselves at risk. It happens to straight and gay, single and married. I have never been comfortable thinking of AIDS as something that 'other people' get.
Its not even probable, let alone scientifically proven, that HIV causes AIDS. If there is evidence that HIV causes AIDS, there should be scientific documents which either singly or collectively demonstrate that fact, at least with a high probability. There are no such documents.
HIV/AIDS is the greatest danger we have faced for many, many centuries. HIV/AIDS is worse than a war. It is like a world war. Millions of people are dying from it.
People wait in line to see me, saying there's plenty of living to be done even if you have an HIV diagnosis. People say they are 10- or 15-year survivors and still moving forward.
Many young people are not having safe sex because they think medicines will make everything okay. The thing about these medicines is that you often have to take them your whole life. They can be very aggressive chemicals for your body. Just because you don't hear of as many people around you dying from HIV/AIDS - just like how it was in the '80s and '90s - you can still die. I'd say to someone who's very young to protect themselves and protect their lives. There's nothing safer than not catching this virus. It's having something that never goes out of your system.
Related Authors
Arnold Schwarzenegger Quotes
Austrian
Actor
Benedict Cumberbatch Quotes
English
Actor
Bruce Lee Quotes
American
Actor
Clint Eastwood Quotes
American
Actor
Daniel Radcliffe Quotes
British
Actor
Dwayne Johnson Quotes
American
Actor
Jeff Bridges Quotes
American
Actor
Johnny Depp Quotes
American
Actor
Kevin Hart Quotes
American
Actor
Kevin Spacey Quotes
American
Actor
Nicolas Cage Quotes
American
Actor
Rob Lowe Quotes
American
Actor
Robert Pattinson Quotes
English
Actor
Sylvester Stallone Quotes
American
Actor
Will Rogers Quotes
American
Actor
Zach Braff Quotes
American
Actor