Creator and host Karl Schmid fights HIV stigma with knowledge

The Switch is a video series sharing positive lifestyles and health routines to help you thrive while living with HIV. Listen to our guests living with HIV talk candidly about the positive switches they have made in their daily lives, including their approach to HIV treatment. Watch more episodes here.

According to Karl Schmid, HIV saved his life.

“It put everything into focus,” the Emmy and GLAAD Award winning creator speaks of his HIV diagnosis in the new episode of The Switch. “It's made me realize not to take myself for granted.”

Schmid has been living with HIV for more than 17 years. Now, Schmid fights HIV stigma through sharing his personal stories with the virus on Plus Life Media and ABC News. But Schmid’s journey with HIV did not start easy — at 27, he tested positive. At first, a sense of shock and terror flooded his head.

“It felt like a red digital countdown clock started ticking backwards over my head,” recalls Schmid of his initial reaction when he learned that he contracted HIV.

Schmid broke the news to his oldest brother first. Together, they sat down and called their parents and grandmother on Skype to disclose Schmid's HIV status.

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“There was this silence,” Schmid says of the few seconds after he told them about his diagnosis. “Then my grandmother, in her heavy Hungarian accent, went, ‘Yeah, so what?’”

To him, Schmid’s grandmother’s response broke the tension. Despite being shocked, Schmid’s parents also embraced their son with care and decided to educate themselves on the virus.

“The more you know,” says Schmid. “The less scary something is. I think that decision — that switch in my mind — that's probably one of the most positive steps I took immediately to change my attitude.”

Schmid aims to end HIV stigma through his activism and storytelling. He encourages people living with HIV and others to learn more about the virus and understands that “undetectable equals untransmittable (U=U).” This means that individuals who maintain an undetectable viral load cannot sexually transmit the virus to others.

“We can end this!” Schmidt passionately gestures. “We can stop this! All right? Now we all can do it. And we should!”