Daniel Defert contributed to "breaking the leaden screed surrounding HIV / AIDS" and to combating "stigma", paid tribute to him Aides, which he founded in 1984.
The academic, who "leaves behind him the indelible memory of a militant life", had understood that "the silence and the stigmatization" of people affected by the virus hindered "the establishment of a real mobilization, of tools adapted and effective solutions", continued the association in a press release.
"We will continue his fight, our fight," she added.
Daniel Defert has "put the patient back at the center" of the fight against AIDS, observed Aurélien Beaucamp, vice-president of Aides, who was its president from 2015 to 2021. "Without him, we would not be here. today", he reminded AFP: at the time of the creation of Aides, in 1984, "we had neither test nor treatment and the patients were victims of a very ostracism. strong".
An associate professor of philosophy and militant of the "clandestine proletarian left", Daniel Defert had founded Aides a few months after the death of his famous companion Michel Foucault, in June 1984 at the age of 57.
"We had campaigned together, and it was a bit of my work of mourning to continue militant work", he explained in 2000.
"A great gentleman" against discrimination
It was the "lies" and the "misunderstandings", in other words the things left unsaid surrounding Foucault's death, which had led him to engage in this fight, he added in 1996. "I wanted to live this mourning by continuing a common story around an ethical issue of speaking out".
Aides, "born out of anger and mourning, will become the first French association to fight against HIV / AIDS in France, and a living, embodied and militant tribute to its companion in struggle", underlined Tuesday the association.
With Foucault, he had also participated in 1971 in the creation of the ephemeral Group of information on prisons, which aimed to give the floor to the prisoners, to alert on the conditions of detention and to reflect on the meaning of incarceration.
“It is with sadness that I learn of the disappearance of the sociologist and philosopher Daniel Defert, a figure in the fight against AIDS,” Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne reacted on Twitter on Wednesday, stressing that he “dedicated his life to helping the victims, to build solidarity".
"Immense gratitude to our very dear Daniel Defert. What memories of our struggles to fight all discrimination. A great man", paid tribute, also on Twitter, the former Minister of Health Roselyne Bachelot.
He was "an exceptional man of humanity, a decisive interlocutor in the fight against AIDS and in general for the recognition of the rights of sick people", added politician Claude Evin, also a former Minister of Health. Health.
“He is a fighter whose voice will be missed,” reacted PS mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo on Twitter.
"Activists in the fight against AIDS owe him so much. He showed us the way. He is our pioneer", also underlined Jean-Luc Romero-Michel, his deputy at the mayor of Paris in charge of the fight against the discriminations.
© 2023 AFP