I feel it's part of my job to make the problems of the poor compelling.

I mean, everybody should have access to medical care. And, you know, it shouldn't be such a big deal.

But as for activism, my parents did what they could, given the constraints, but were never involved in the causes I think of when I think of activists.

What I can argue is that no one should have to die of a disease that is treatable.

I recommend the same therapies for all humans with HIV. There is no reason to believe that physiologic responses to therapy will vary across lines of class, culture, race or nationality.

If I am hungry, that is a material problem; if someone else is hungry, that is a spiritual problem.

Since I do not believe that there should be different recommendations for people living in the Bronx and people living in Manhattan, I am uncomfortable making different recommendations for my patients in Boston and in Haiti.