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Today is World AIDS Day, a day dedicated to raising awareness about the disease and remembering those lost to it. It has been observed annually on this date since 1988, but for the first time, the United States government is not formally commemorating the occasion this year. Donald Trump’s State Department has instructed its employees and grantees “to refrain from messaging on any commemorative days, including World AIDS Day,” in an email obtained by the New York Times. Although they are still allowed to “tout the work” being done “to counter this dangerous disease and other infectious diseases around the world,” they should “refrain from publicly promoting World AIDS Day through any communication channels.” State Department spokesperson Tommy Pigott told the Times it was part of a change in approach to combating infectious diseases: “An awareness day is not a strategy.”
Madonna, Trump’s fellow 1980s NYC nightlife maven, is no fan of this policy. In a statement posted to her social media accounts, the pop star wrote the following:
Today is World AIDS Day. For four decades, this day has been internationally recognized around the world by people from all walks of
life, because millions of people’s lives have been touched by the HIV crisis. People have lost lovers and husbands and wives and girlfriends and boyfriends and mothers and daughters and children to this deadly disease, of which there is still no cure.Donald Trump has announced that World AIDS Day should no longer be acknowledged. It’s one thing to order federal agents to refrain from commemorating this day, but to ask the general public to pretend it never happened is ridiculous, it’s absurd, it’s unthinkable. I bet he’s never watched his best friend die of AIDS, held their hand, and watched the blood drain from their face as they took their last breath at the age of 23.
The list of people that I have known and loved and lost to AIDS is pretty long. I’m sure many of you out there can relate. Let me say it one more time- there still isn’t a cure for AIDS, and people still die from it. I refuse to acknowledge that these people have died in vain. And I will continue to honor World AIDS Day, and I hope you will honor it with me.
Madonna previously criticized Trump in a speech at the Women’s March On Washington in 2017, prompting Trump to describe her as “disgusting.”