When I read the Saturday Globe and Mail each week (and it usually takes me the whole week), I keep my eye out for stories on development issues. Yesterday, in the middle of the Globe Review, I came across this article about a Vancouver artist who is HIV positive. My immediate reaction was, “oh great! Something about development!” I clipped out the article and put it in my notebook and continued to wait for the Bathurst streetcar. Then it dawned on me: this guy probably doesn’t think of himself as a development issue.

Blame it on the fact that my thesis is due next Monday (my topic is how microeconomic development projects can reduce HIV risk), but when I think of HIV/AIDS, I don’t just think of it as an illness. In my head (and in the data), HIV/AIDS is inextricably entwined with poverty as both a cause and an effect. This understanding of the pandemic means yes, indeed, it is a development issue.

But what about when HIV/AIDS should be thought about in terms of health rather than development? I can’t speak for Mr. Kerr, but it seems that his status could be a result of a time when we didn’t know a lot about the disease rather than because of poverty and its side effects. I had to take a step back and realize that this article, though interesting, wasn’t about international development at all, but about an individual, his health, and his art.