Charlie Sheen hopes to get his life back after revealing he is HIV positive
In a revealing interview, American actor Charlie Sheen admitted today that he is a carrier of the AIDS virus, a public confession in a prime-time space with which he hopes to restore personal peace and his professional career.
Sheen, 50, the son of actor Martin Sheen and one of the leading figures on American television today thanks to his role in the television series "Two and a half man", has frequently appeared in the media over the past few years for his disordered life and the abuse of alcohol and drugs.
Today it was he who appeared on television to stop a series of rumors that had spread in the last two days and confirm the suspicions: "I am here to admit that I am HIV positive," he said when interviewed on the morning show " Today".
The actor, whose real name is Carlos Irwin Estévez, a New Yorker by birth and grandson of a Spanish emigrant, revealed that he had decided to make his condition public, fed up with paying "millions" of dollars to people who have been blackmailing him for a long time.
"I think I'm free from this prison from today," he said.
It all started four years ago when he consulted doctors for a severe headache and a "maddening" migraine. "I thought it was a brain tumor, I thought it was finished," said the actor, divorced three times and with five children.
Subsequent tests confirmed that he was carrying the acquired immunodeficiency virus (HIV), "three letters that are hard to absorb," he said today when referring to the acronym for that disease.
Sheen, who was interviewed on NBC's star morning show, was accompanied by his treating doctor for more than five years, Robert Huizenga, a professor of clinical medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).
According to the doctor, once it was known that the actor was infected, he was put under treatment and now his contagion levels are "undetectable". "Charlie doesn't have AIDS, he's healthy," the doctor insisted.
He said he has to take four pills a day and have tests every four months, but Huizenga also acknowledged that one of his concerns is the actor's alcohol abuse and how it may affect treatment.
He pointed out that the chances of him transmitting the disease are "incredibly low", but even so, Charlie Sheen made it clear that, since he found out he had the virus, he had S- with a Co or with people who were under the care of his doctor.
But Charlie Sheen not only revealed the personal drama that he is going through but also the extortion that he has been suffering since a date that he did not specify, from people who extorted millions of dollars from him for not revealing the news.
When he found out that he was HIV positive he told relatives and acquaintances. "Some people I trusted, from my close circle, I thought they could help, but it turned out they betrayed me," he added.
He paid an amount of money "that reached millions", money that, from now on, he stopped paying because he has made his condition public and will no longer be the object of extortion.
All of this has left him in a financial situation that "isn't very good," but he added: "I'm a survivor. It's another chapter in my life."
Sheen hopes that, from now on, the media will stop airing news about his state of health that he believes to be distorted and that has worsened in recent days when the possibility that he could be a carrier of the virus was leaked.
They came to publish that "I knew that he had AIDS and that he was consciously transmitting it, something that is far from the truth," he said.
Having made this revelation, Charlie Sheen now wants his life back. People in his professional circle, who knew of his condition, have promised him a new show on Sony, and he is awaiting dates for two new movies.
"So far there has been no resistance," the actor said about the possibility of him losing professional opportunities by admitting that he is infected with the AIDS virus.
