“I wanted to tell you this a long time ago, but I wasn’t ready-I’m ready now, that I’m HIV positive, and I have been for 12 years”, Pintauro told her on Oprah: Where Are They Now.
Advertisement
The ‘Who’s the Boss?’ star appeared on Oprah’s Where Are They Now? on Saturday, and talked about crystal meth and sex.
Danny Pintauro is opening up about his past drug use and being HIV-positive. “And I have been for 12 years”.
The Who’s The Boss? star said, “It really did come out of the blue for me. You go in, and you sort of waited two weeks on pins and needles-or at least I did, because I was just terrified of the idea of getting HIV”.
The actor, who portrayed Jonathan on the family sitcom for eight years, opened the Q&A by coming right out with this troubling piece of information. “No one’s ever going to want me, ‘” Pintauro told the host.
He added to Oprah: “There’s this very bad feeling of, ‘I’m never going to be able to have a good relationship”.
“This guy was not on HIV medications, so his viral load was through the roof, I’m sure – especially because he’s doing a lot of drugs and not taking care of himself – so those factors combined to still find a way to have me contract HIV”.
“When I first came out, which was before everybody – I mean, Ellen and I came out the same year”.
Pintauro, 39, came out publicly as a gay man in 1997 after he said a tabloid reporter told him he would be outed with or without his consent.
“It’s backwards. You’ve spent so much time terrified that you’re going to get it, and then you have it”, he explained.
Advertisement
Daniel now lives with his husband Wil Tabares in Las Vegas and is the manager of a restaurant and has urged other members of the gay community to look after themselves.
