Renowned HIV/AIDS activist Hydeia Broadbent has passed away at age 39, her family announced this week.
Her father, Loren Broadbent, shared the tragic news in a Facebook post on Tuesday night.
“With great sadness, I must inform you all that our beloved friend, mentor and daughter Hydeia, passed away today after living with Aids since birth,” he wrote. “Despite facing numerous challenges throughout her life, Hydeia remained determined to spread hope and positivity through education around HIV/AIDS.”
Broadbent has dedicated her life to raising awareness about the disease that she has lived with since she was born. She was abandoned when she was a baby by her mother, who had a drug addiction, and left at a hospital in Las Vegas, Nevada — where she was adopted. Her diagnosis came when she was 3 years old. It came at a time when not much was known about pediatric AIDS, and she wasn’t expected to live much longer.
Years later, Broadbent famously appeared on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” in 1996 and explained that when she turned 5, she started experiencing symptoms of AIDS, including blood infections, pneumonia, and fungus in her brain. While on the program, Oprah asked her about the “hardest part” of living with the disease.
“When your friends die. You always lose a friend to AIDS,” she said tearfully. “No one really knows how long anybody’s going to live.”
She continued: “If you stay in your bed and feel sorry for yourself and don’t get up with the birds and just sit there saying, ‘I’m going to die,’ why get up and try to make a difference? But when you say, ‘Today’s another day. I can get up, I can do something’ … make something positive.”
She has also appeared as a guest on other television programs like “Good Morning America” and “A Conversation with Magic Johnson” on Nickelodeon. She has been widely covered in the news and has used her voice to speak at well-esteemed education institutions, including Howard University and Spelman College.
Her latest TikTok videos show her jamming to her favorite artists, especially R&B singer Chris Brown, whom she dreamed of meeting one day. Many people paid tribute to Broadbent on social media.
Actress Jurnee Smollett recalled her deep friendship with Broadbent, which started during their childhood. The “Lovecraft Country” star credited Broadbent for being a trailblazer and inspiring her to get involved in the fight to destigmatize HIV/AIDS.
“I thank God for her light, her will,” Smollett said. “I will miss her laughter, her dancing, her joyous smile that lit up her beautiful big cheeks, her awful taste in tv shows, her hilarious way of making fun of how I’m really a boring nerd inside, our drives listening to music really loud, the tears we shed over heartbreaks, the way she wore her heart on her sleeve and was unable to get through a motivational talk without tearing up at some point. Courage was her middle name. A literal goddess with an otherworldly strength. A warrior’s heart who fought till the end. Rest well beautiful one.”
In 2002, Broadbent’s mother released a book titled “You Get Past the Tears: A Memoir of Love and Survival,” about how the family grappled with their reality and how, despite the challenges, the groundbreaking activist has inspired others with her story.
