Woman's Hour - Trisha Goddard, HIV prevention, Family favourites, Air pollution

Episode Date: June 19, 2025

Trisha Goddard rose to fame as a TV journalist. She was the first black TV presenter in Australia and is best known in the UK for her eponymous TV show which aired on ITV and Channel 5 in the late 90s and 2000s, earning her a reputation as the British Oprah. She joins Anita to talk about her career, appearing on Celebrity Big Brother and why she chose recently to go public with her diagnosis for stage 4 metastatic breast cancer.Air pollution kills more than 500 people a week in the UK and costs more than 500 million pounds a week in ill health, according to a new report, "A breath of fresh air," by the Royal College of Physicians. The report highlights growing evidence about health issues linked to toxic air and calls it “a public health crisis”. Today, a group of doctors, nurses and campaigners are walking from Great Ormond Street Hospital to Downing Street with a letter calling on government ministers to commit to more ambitious air quality targets. Anita talks to two of them, Rosamund Kissi Debrah, whose daughter Ella became the first person in the UK to have air pollution cited on their death certificate and Professor Sir Stephen Holgate, co author of today's report.Only 3.1% of PREP users in England are women. That's Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis, a drug that reduces the risk of being infected with HIV. Many women don’t know that PREP exists, or don’t consider themselves at risk. Yet women accounted for 30% of new HIV diagnoses in England in 2023. Today, the Elton John AIDS Foundation is launching pilot programmes to increase women's access to PREP. Anita is joined by Dr Jenny Whetham, Consultant and Joint Clinical Lead, Sexual Health and HIV Medicine, Brighton and Anne Aslett, CEO of the Elton John AIDS FoundationThe clever one. The funny one. The beautiful one. But which one is The Favourite? Set over a single week, but examining the highs and lows that define a family over the decades, this book is a story of rivalries and long-held resentments, about loss and grief and blame – and love. Fran Littlewood – also author of New York Times bestseller Amazing Grace Adams talks to Anita about her new novel.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Rebecca Myatt

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. BBC Sounds music radio podcasts. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning and welcome to the programme. Trisha Goddard was the first black woman on Australian television and the queen of UK daytime in the late 90s and early 2000s. You may have seen her most recently in the celebrity Big Brother house speaking very frankly about living with stage four cancer. Well, Tricia is here and will be telling us all about her

extraordinary life. The Royal College of Physicians warns that 99% of the population breathes toxic air. This morning morning a letter is being delivered to Downing Street calling on the government to commit to air quality targets. We will be talking also about a new pilot scheme focused on HIV prevention for women and this is for all of you, are you the favourite child? Do you have a favourite child? Today we're talking to Fran Littlewood about her new book called The Favourite. It's about three sisters in their forties who, without giving away any

spoilers, realise that one of them is favoured over the others. Is this something you can relate to? Have you been brought up in the shadow of a sibling or two? And what effect has it had on you? Do you know you prefer one child more than the other and you try and hide it? A lot of South Asian women of a certain generation will know what it means to grow up as a daughter and treated like a second-class citizen. But what effect does it have knowing that? How you feel you're treated and viewed as a child can have a lasting impact.

So I want to know, were you told you were the clever one, the pretty one, the capable one, the disastrous one, the daft one? Did you live up to the title? Do you think it had a negative impact? Was it a burden of responsibility or did it become a self-fulfilling prophecy? Your thoughts, your opinions and remember you don't have to give me your name. You can remain anonymous if you want to unburden yourself with how you really feel about your children or your parents.

Text me in the usual way, the number is 84844. You can email the program by going to our website and you can WhatsApp us on 03700 100444. And if you'd like to follow us on social media, it's at BBC Woman's Hour. But first, air pollution is killing more than 500 people a week in the UK and costing more than £500 million a week in ill health, according to a landmark new report by the Royal College of Physicians. The report, called A Breath of Fresh Air Responding to the Health Challenges

of Modern Air Pollution, highlights the growing evidence about the health issues linked to toxic air and is calling it a public health crisis. Today a group of doctors, nurses and campaigners are walking from Great Ormond Street Hospital to Downing Street with a letter calling on government ministers to commit to more ambitious air quality targets. Among them is Rosamund Kissy-Debra whose daughter Ella became the first person in the UK to have air pollution sighted on their death certificate. Rosamund joins me now on the line. She's on the walk, which is just setting off, along with Professor Sir Stephen Holgate, who's

an expert on air quality and the co-author of today's report. A very good morning to both of you. Thank you for taking the time to talk to me. Rosamund, I'm going to start with you. Tell us why you're on this walk today. I am on this walk to raise awareness among the public because they need to know about the threat of air pollution and the impact it is having on everyone's health. And also to send a message to our government that this is a matter we care deeply around.

Those figures which you read out are absolutely horrendous and we all now know it is contributing to that long wait, you know, that long list of 7.5 million people waiting for treatment. Air pollution impacts every organ in the body and we're trying to get the message out to the general public and as you say Stephen who was the expert witness in my daughter's case he has released this new report which supports everything the coroner said. It's no different we're just making our case even stronger now. I'm going to bring Stephen in because Stephen the statistics I just read out in the opener there are alarming. So what are the key findings of this report? Yes, good morning and what a pleasure it is to be standing outside Great Ormond Street to see these larger number of people about to walk in

support of cleaner air. Well we depend upon air to breathe and of course fresh air is what we depend upon for life. and of course fresh air is what we depend upon for life. So when the air contains toxic materials, we get into trouble. And the air pollution, though we can't see it or taste it or even watch it rise and fall on a day-to-day basis, it's around us all the time, indoors and outdoors. And the main findings of the report, apart from the financial issues you mentioned, are the fact that it does affect every organ. It starts preconception, so it

can even affect fertility, right the way through pregnancy to the newborn baby with smaller organs developing. And in addition to all of that, up to 700 diseases now are known to be influenced by toxic air that we breathe on a regular basis. So this is a major public health issue, not just an environmental one, which is where it was considered previously. It is a public health one and it's one that people can't control themselves, particularly those living in situations where air pollution is much higher in the parts of Britain where there are inequalities and poor living standards. And you've called it a public health crisis. Yeah indeed it is because of all the diseases there aren't many that are

affected by a single set of agents and we know that if over 700 diseases are affected by this it must be a public health crisis. What else can we call it? And of course it is preventable. And we do need to strengthen our resolve now to reduce the levels of air pollution to the World Health Organization limit values, which are about a quarter of what we currently have in the UK at present so we've got a long way to go. Over 350 healthcare professionals have signed the letter

that's being delivered to Downing Street this morning. What are you calling for exactly? In essence we want air pollution to be taken seriously now. Often it's brushed into the long grass as if it's just another issue that a lot of people make a lot of noise on. This is a public health issue. We want a campaign to inform the public properly about the health risks of air pollution, not just that it's a problem but how and why and what they can do about it. We want politicians both in central government and in local government to look at their environments and think

well what can we do to improve our environment and therefore improve the health of the population and we want a particular focus on those communities who are at most risk of air poor air quality and those are the ones living in disadvantaged communities who actually contribute the least pollutants compared to the richer part of our society. Rosamund, you've been campaigning in this area for years. How do you feel about the report and how do you feel being on this march this morning? I just wonder how your personal experience must be being surrounded by all these health

care professionals about to take this report to 10 Downing Street. We've come a long way and I am incredibly pleased about that. It shows us the message is getting through but this involves action from all groups as Stephen said especially the government. It is absolutely fantastic to have people in health out because obviously they see the fallout when people come to the A&E on very high air pollution days there are more heart attacks, there are more asthma attacks, so this is having a real impact on people's lives. And as Stephen said, the people we are most concerned about, they are the vulnerable, children, the elderly, marginalised groups. And thank you for giving us the space to raise this

on your programme. Can you remind us Rosamund about Ella's Law and what stage that's at at the moment? Sharnberry is going to be reintroducing it on the 1st of July and I urge all MPs, cross-party, to take a clear look at it. It is about both outdoor air and indoor air because we are also concerned about indoor air. During Covid we learned a lot about the air we are breathing inside. So Stephen's report reflects both outdoor and indoor air. Stephen, can you tell us about the particular risks for children and what parents can do when they can't control air quality? Yeah, so that's one of the big issues, of course, because it's not like tobacco smoking,

it's not a voluntary thing. Air pollution is other people contributing to the toxic air, but we all contribute to the toxic air. So I think, you know, setting an example is a good thing. And what better place to start than in schools? I mean, having vehicles parked outside of schools with their engines running, having classrooms with poor ventilation so that the children are exposed to pollution that builds up in the classroom, blunting their learning, having the opportunity of children walking to school

instead of always having to take transport. These are practical things that really make a difference, but they also improve the quality of life for children and their families as well. I think the other thing about this is that we've just got to think about air pollution like we do about water pollution. You know, if we had 30,000 deaths brought forward every year with water pollution, there'd be thousands on the streets shouting and screaming. But that's the situation with air pollution. 30,000 deaths each year brought forward due to air pollution. So we want people to stand

up, be counted and influence both locally and centrally the change that is desperately needed to meet the WHO air quality guideline values. And Rosamund, how does it feel being there today? It's always emotional, but I'm very glad Steve is here with me. And likeamund, how does it feel being there today? It's always emotional but I'm very glad Stephen's here with me and like you said, air pollution is killing us and we need to start doing something about it. The government need to take this matter seriously. An unhealthy child equals an unhealthy adult. I would like to thank you both for taking the time out to talk to me this morning, Rosamund, Kissy, Deborah and Professor Stephen Holgate. We have had a statement from the government

who say air pollution is a public health issue and we're committed to tackling the issue across the country. We've already provided £575 million to support local authorities to improve air quality and are developing a series of interventions to reduce emissions so that everyone's exposure to air pollution is reduced. That text number 84844, I'm going to read out a couple of your messages coming in about whether you were the favourite or not in your family. I was the clever one in my family and my sister was the pretty one. Result, I grew up thinking I was plain, which was not true, and my sister grew up thinking she was thick. Sorry about the term. Also not true. The favourite was my brother because he was a boy and the youngest. And another one here saying, I'm a grandmother

and I'm struggling. There's five years between my first and second grandchildren and it's very difficult to feel the same for me. Even though I love them both, I adore the firstborn grandson. 84844. Keep them coming in. Very excited to talk to my next guest who is sitting in front of me. Trisha Goddard began her journalism career in the 80s in Australia where she became the first black TV presenter. On her return to the UK where she was born, her eponymous daytime talk show earned her a reputation as the British Oprah Winfrey. Trisha was broadcast for 12 years from 1998 on ITV and Channel 5 before Trisha Goddard moved to NBC in the US. She's since hosted radio shows and GMB and now based in America is a CNN contributor and regular commentator on global issues. Last year she went public

with her diagnosis for stage four metastatic breast cancer which means it's spread to another part of her body. In April she went on Celebrity Big Brother in the UK and now Tricia welcome to Woman's Hour. Before we talk about Big Brother because I think we should start at the most recent thing, How are you today? I'm okay. I'm okay. This is my first solo trip to the, back to Britain since I came out about my breast cancer. When I was hiding it, because of course I didn't tell anybody for 19 months, I had a wig made exactly like my hair extensions. I carried on with CNN. I covered the coronation of King Charles. They flew me over here. I was in the studio all the

time with my colleagues Anderson Cooper and Don Lemon. And you told nobody? Told nobody. And this was in 2023? Yeah. After four and a half months of weekly chemo which was bloody brutal. Why tell no one? I had to come to terms with it myself and I remember this is not my first dance with cancer and the first time around I was outed literally

within hours of finding out. This is 2008. 2008 I went to North Canorich Hospital nuclear oncology department shaking like a chihuahua because I've been diagnosed the night before and I got home to the phone ringing and it was a news desk from a tabloid newspaper saying, we've heard you're in hospital and you're dying. I'm basically saying that if you don't give us the story, we'll publish that. I hadn't told daddy, I only just told my kids. I hadn't told my... So then began something that still traumatizes my now adult children. I had to have security in the hospital. The National Health basically said, we can't treat you here and guarantee that while you're having your radiation treatment or while you're having your chemo, someone

won't photograph it. Newspapers were offering £50 for a photograph of me. My housekeepers were harassed. My children were. I had to have security in my private hospital. They had to move my bed to a back room. There was a kerfuffle outside my room one day, flowers on the floor, a journalist. I'll use the term loosely. Somebody had tried to pretend they were into floor delivering flowers. I mean, it was so traumatic actually. That is one of the reasons I stayed in America. I was so angry and upset at a medium I've always championed. I've always wanted to be a journalist, from doing my school newspaper when I was 10 years old to being a runner-up in Young Filmmaker at the Year

Award. On my whole life, I've wanted to be a journalist and I started off in news and current affairs as a journalist. And the fact that my own industry would see a cancer diagnosis as an opportunity horrified me. So anyway, why did I not tell anybody this time for 90 months? Because of that. I mean, I, you know, because of that, that's one of the things. Sounds beyond traumatic. Yeah, and I also know, I'm a grown-up, I know that if an employer finds out you have a life-limiting or a chronic illness and many many people listening to this will know this, we cannot ensure that we are going to be allowed to stay in our employment. They will find a way to make it either impossible, you know, for people with maybe Crohn's disease or Huntington's

or motor neurone, they may have flare-ups and your employer will make it impossible to have those, you know, the time off or time to pop to the doctors or things like that. So I knew that. So I kept it really, really quiet until I was ready to come out. And I was kind of forced out in a nice way. I was covering, I was told by Anderson Cooper, standby, we've got an announcement from the palace. We didn't know what it was going to be. And of course, it was Katherine talking about her diagnosis. And we had to be on standby and I have a studio in my house in America. And it came out with that. And I was like, as a journalist, I've been hiding from my colleagues sitting next to them. At one stage, literally got off the

table from having radiation and went to the studio. I said I can't in all fairness report on this without being honest. So I did the report, Sons wig, took my wig off. For the first time. For the first time and one of my, somebody down the line, you know, one of the engineers who knows me me, says, hey, like the new hair Trish. So anyway, I did the report along with other people and Anderson came to me and I talked about it and I said, as I well know, Anderson, because for the last 19 months I've been going through chemotherapy and it was like they sent a car for me and Anderson was lovely. Yeah. And what was the reaction you got from people watching?

Positive, positive. I mean, I can laugh. I've got a dark sense of humour. And if I can just tell you this, I think it's funny anyway, I was in the studio before I'd come out and see you. You can tell us anything. In fact, we're here for all the school hours. I was working with the lovely Don Lemon. I like him. He's fantastically supportive. But I was working with Don Lemon. He and I were in the studio. It was a commercial break. I had one makeup artist who knew my... I said, don't take my wig off. Anyway, I was sitting there and I used to get these spontaneous nosebleeds

when I was having my chemo every week. Anyway, so I get this nosebleed and Don's sort of pointing to my nose in the commercial break, nose nose. So I put up a tissue and it was all this blood. I was devastated. Anyway, come back from the commercial break and on we go. So I got home and I said to my darling husband, I was really upset. I said, oh my God, it's a West Indian mummy in me. I said to my darling husband, I was really upset. I said, oh my God, is the West Indian mummy in me? I said, oh my God, I let myself down. I had nosebleed, God, I don't know what Don would have thought. And my husband said, darling, in your industry, don't worry.

They probably thought you'd done too much cocaine. I know it's like, I don't know what's worse for somebody to know I'm in chemo or that I'm with some kind of cocaine. what's worse for somebody to know I'm in chemo or that I'm with some kind of cocaine addict. I also read that anecdote that you said that in my industry you probably know how to deal with a cocaine addict better than someone going through chemo. It's true. It's true. Even an employer would. Why did you choose to go on Celebrity Big Brother? I've been asked every single year since the damn show started and I would

always gave a very swear word reply. I talked to my older daughter Billy and I said, oh, they've asked me to go on Celebrity Big Brother and she said, Mummy, you're so passionate about services around people with life limiting illness with cancer and disabilities and you're shouting into

this social media stumbling about in social media, you know, you're trying to get this message across. I've done a lot of work in America around this and health inequalities and what have you. I've done a lot of work in America around this and health inequalities and what have you. I've done a lot of work with my cancer center, who's bloody fantastic. And she said, mommy, this is the best platform. You can get an ear to government because I've got friends, like darling friends, like Sarah

Standing, I'm seeing her later, and darling friends going through cancer who've, they say, oh my God, I can't believe you've got this. We don't get that. I get my scan results within hours. They're waiting weeks. The mental health stress is appalling. And Billy said, go on Big Brother and talk about it. Show that you can live with a life-limiting disease. We don't use the terminal anymore, it's life-limiting. And so I did. Between the first cancer diagnosis in 2008 and your most recent and you have always, whenever I see you doing anything, everything about you is about living life. You live it to the fullest. Has it taken a journey to get to that place this time around?

Yeah, look, I have dark days. I have dark days during my chemo every single week, I have dark, dark days and I don't care how many times people tell me, oh, your hair looks lovely. To a woman and to a man, apparently men take it worse, losing all your hair is, I don't know, I don't know. In many societies, you cut your hair or shave your hair to show grief. And there is always a grief because your loss of hair reminds you that you're not quote unquote normal. I grieve for the person who could cross country run. I was coming up for my first ice skating exam. I started skating at 62 mad back that I am.

I have no feeling from my knees down. I'm having to learn to walk again constantly and to skate again. And the frustration, I've got a brilliant skating coach the frustration I feel at not being able to do simple things I could before because I can't feel my feet in my boots and if I walk number 10 Downing Street yeah which, which you were there yesterday. Yesterday.

Talking about, and it was for? Windrush Day. Windrush Day. Yes. Windrush Day. Mummy would have been proud, and I pounced on Sukhia Stama. That's another story. Well, you can tell us.

No, I pounced on him about just the things I'm talking about, about the, you know, that all of us, many of us with chronic illness fear unemployment or want to get back to the jobs that we did. And now with all this PIP and cuts, there's fear in the community. Although those of us with life-limiting illness aren't impacted, our benefits, if I say are, because I feel it in my heart, people contact me, it's the stuff around it that it's going to be taken away from. That's personal independence payments. Yeah. And the government has said this is a consultation, pathways to work, reforming benefits and support to get written, working, green paper open. It it's open until June 30th and it's looking closely

at what support would be needed for people who may lose their entitlements. People have got to get vocal now. You mentioned Mummy. Your mum, I think we should hear a bit about your life. And also just to put into context for people, I mean there won't be many, but just to understand where that frustration comes from because your life has been so energetic and you've achieved so much.

But back to the beginning, your mum came here as part of the Windrush generation, met your father. Well, a man. A man. And Trisha, there's so much that's happened in your life. One of those things is that discovering that your father wasn't your birth parents, but you didn't find out until after your mother's death.

Would you wish you were able to speak to her about it? That's a tough one. I mean, my whole life, life obviously I knew I was different. My half-sisters are lighter than my kids and I was very different. It's interesting you're going to be talking about favourites. Right, yeah. How did you feel? Did you feel you weren't a favourite or the opposite or like... Mum championed me. Mum pushed me and told me I had to be twice as good as to be half as good.

Mum championed me. She would celebrate my every success. And then Dad would punish me for those successes, often physically. Um... So... Um... I prefer to live in Mummy's shadow, but I was very angry with her after she died.

I mean, people say, how could you not know? Remember in the 1950s, I was born in 1957. We were always the only black family around. We moved to central East Africa because of the racism around a black man and a white woman being together. I had a fantastic childhood in East Africa, fantastic. But then we came back to Britain and oh my God, did it hit me hard. I was saved by my school, Sir William Perkins, teacher's day was yesterday, shout out to Mrs. Millard. Saved. I mean, I mean that. Yeah. But mum was a fighter. People say, how come you chose journalism?

Yeah. She'd listen to the radio, shows like this one back in the day. God, she'd be proud. And she'd shout at the radio, no, you can't say that. Oh, yeah, yeah. She'd shout. My parents would literally paint placards in their front room. They were very, very active politically. And encouraged debates and conversation. So how then do you go from being in Britain and then becoming the first black woman on Australian TV? I didn't realize that. As Black woman on TV in Australia?

Listen, when the reporters hit me with that... What a fact! I didn't know! I didn't even think of it. I said I didn't apply for the job of first Black presenter. I actually applied for a job as a reporter.

I was on another ethnic network as a journo on the road a reporter I was on another ethnic network as a journal on the road and I was applying for the job as a journal for the 730 report on the ABC and I was given the role of presenter and all these journalists came in David Hill said ladies and gentlemen the new presenter of the 730 report and somebody said oh what does it feel like because I can do an Australian accent I once had. What does it feel like to be the first black black on television shouldn't you be aboriginal it's a vice it's the bicentenary and I I was like flummoxed because I didn't apply to be the first black anything. I was just me.

You got the job. I just was me. And then you moved back to the UK. What brought you back? And you got an immensely popular show dubbed the British Opera. I hate that label. Yeah, I was going to ask you how you feel about it. I hate that label. I think, you know, if I say it's racist, people know she's playing the race card. But it's like, we're very different people.

Yeah, just both happen to be black women. Yeah. I could have been the British Phil Donahue or Maury Povich. Or Jerry Springer, because that was a big... Well, it was a big influence on the show, wasn't it? I know Jerry. I knew Jerry. I knew Jerry. There were two Jerrys. I knew Jerry. He died of cancer just after I was diagnosed and we... I allowed him to share my PA, Jenna, and I rang Jenna up and we didn't speak, we just cried. That's powerful.

Your show was very of its time, and it was very, it was that kind of style of Jerry Springer TV show, and then it sort of, it went out of fashion. What do you think about it when you look back and the work that you were doing? I don't know, I sure had a heart. And for instance, we had three counselors.

I had my team constantly talked to by and supported by the local mind, mental health group, and what have you. So we tried to be as kind as possible. And one is always treading a line between ratings and kindness, to be honest. It was of its age. It was of its age. I was reading about the programme and you fronting it. It was fascinating. For me, growing up, watching you on TV was really important to see you in that landscape because you were one of the very few and people, we should remember that, very important part of the British media landscape. I never get any awards though.

Why not? Never. Why not? Never. Why is that? Never. I'm never on a list. Fleur Easter will be on a list before me. Never. What do you feel about that?

It never bothered me until now. Because you know, to quote Princess Catherine, the new normal and getting used to uncertainty. You never know. My cancer counts are really, really low at the moment, but people say, why don't you celebrate? It's because you can bounce up. It's like putting out fires. But now I do feel something. I think what triggered me, if I can use that word, is seeing lists, and I don't take away from them, I really don't, but seeing lists of the top 10 influential, 20 influential women of color of this century, yada, yada, yada, and there's like three influencers

who are five years old. And that's all really cruel. No, you should be there. Maybe you should be there, Trisha. You're allowed to feel this because you're... I don't feel it because of, you know, I've been paid for what I do. I do a lot that I'm not paid for. But I guess what upsets me are things that I'm passionate about,

like mental health and now this, like home start, you know, parenting, early years. I've been patron of Norwich and now Norfolk home start for 25 years. I sort of feel by not being recognized for those roles, those causes aren't recognized, you know, and they are pushed into a corner. Mental health's not sexy and neither is early parenting, unfortunately. I mean you talk about a lot of things that are very close to your hearts and you're a great advocate for many, many causes and you're brilliant at bringing them to the public, but I would argue you should be on that list just by virtue of who you are before any of the causes.

You should be on the list. I do want to ask you about something we are going to be talking about later on in the program because we're going to be talking about HIV prevention for women, a conversation that hasn't come up for a long time. But your first husband died of AIDS. Looking back, if you don't mind, how did you go through that? How did you deal with that situation? Well, it was 1986. AIDS was unheard of. I had separated from Robert. He was a conservative politician in Australia. Looking back, he was clearly gay. I wouldn't have minded if he told me. He didn't tell me about his diagnosis.

It was after his death. And the then attorney general, who was a very close friend of his, rang me up and said he, you know, he didn't have leukemia or anything like that. He had AIDS. When I just had, I finished that relationship, I'd just had Billy, my daughter. I had to go to St. Vincent's Hospital in Sydney and I was greeted by a doctor in full, like, yeah, hazard kit, yeah, hazmat kit. And I said, I was shaking, I said, do I have to have my daughter tested? Because I didn't want her pricked with needles. She was like a few weeks old. And I was breastfeeding her in the waiting room rocking and then I'll never forget this doctor said no because if you've got it I mean you're breastfeeding so hmm I had to wait weeks

for the result it was the most horrific weight in my life and I was clear absolutely shocking and people say don't you hate him? Weren't you angry? I was sad for him. That he'd had to live his life like that. I was sad. Then I got very, very involved with LGBTQ world. Because in those days, that was the only people, if I said my husband died of AIDS,

they were the only people who could relate and I've been involved with LGBTQ on a load of issues ever since then. And very quickly, why did you move to America? Like I said, first of all anger and fear and then I kind of got stuck there after my divorce and then I fell in love. Can I mention your husband's name? Alan. Alan. Big support. Yeah. We met through breast cancer because his first late darling wife passed. She had breast cancer and he nursed her to the end and when we met he said he was a widower and I said, did your

wife die of breast cancer? And he looked at me and he said, you only know that because I think you had breast cancer. And when I was diagnosed again, the first thing I said to him was, oh my God, I'm sorry to put you through this again. And he says gooey stuff like, these are the best days of his life and indeed mine. That's wonderful to hear. And on that note, Tricia Goddard, thank you so much for coming in to speak to me on One Muzzower. Thank you.

84844 is the text number. I'm Andini and I'm looking back on the life of a Hollywood icon whose legacy lives on through more than just her film roles. She was someone who was interested in invention all her life. She wasn't that interested in the film that she was supposed to be starring in. She was much more interested in the latest invention that she was working on. Who developed an idea so revolutionary that it's still being used today. Frequency hopping.

It was used for secure military communications. It's in GPS, it's in Wi-Fi, it's in Bluetooth. From the BBC World Service, Untold Legends, Hedy Lamarr. Available now wherever you get your BBC podcasts. you get your BBC podcasts. Onto the topic we were just mentioning there. Only 3.1% of PREP users in England are women. That's pre-exposure prophylaxis, a drug that reduces the risk of getting HIV. Many women don't know that

PrEP exists or don't consider themselves at risk, yet women accounted for 30% of new HIV diagnosis in England in 2023. Today the Elton John AIDS Foundation is launching pilot programs to increase women's access to pre-exposure prophylaxis. The pilots will run across sites in London, Liverpool, Brighton and Hove and West Sussex. And I'm joined now by Dr. Jenny Wheaton, Consultant and Joint Clinical Lead at Sexual Health and HIV Medicine, Brighton, and Anne Aslett, CEO of the Elton John AIDS Foundation.

Welcome to both of you. I'm gonna come to you first, Anne. I think we should just understand some of the facts and figures. How prevalent is HIV amongst women in the UK Well, it's much more prevalent than people actually realize and as you said in your opening It's the highest percentage of new infections is women in Heterosexual sex of any group in the UK, which I think might shock quite a lot of your listeners

Definitely that 30% figure. Yeah, because we still associate HIV, after all these years, as simply a gay disease, and it isn't. So the reason why we're launching these pilots is we really want to find ways to reach women in a way that's accessible and affordable so that they're not at risk and they understand what they can do to protect themselves. Can you explain that 30% figure because that's surprising as well. Is that high? Like what's happening? What does that mean?

Yeah that's high. I mean that's changed dramatically over the last 20 years and I think the problem is that, you know, HIV has gone away in people's heads in an awful lot of ways. We do have effective treatment and people kind of don't see it as a problem. I think they worry more about sexually transmitted infections. If you have a sexually transmitted infection, you're more vulnerable to HIV, which I think is another thing people don't understand. So,, it's about raising awareness, it's about getting treatment to people when they need it, and particularly to women. Who's most at risk? So particularly women from black African and Caribbean communities, immigrants to this country, sex workers, people who have

less agency over when and how they have sex. But you know, also it's people who might be in long-term relationships where they're not really sure about their partner's sexual activity. And it's something we don't talk about. We still have this massive stigma around HIV, even from what Trisha was talking about. You know, all these years later, it is still seen as something which is, you know, dirty or morally inappropriate in some way. And something to be feared.

And something to be feared. Whereas actually whereas actually you know if you know your status and we did a we did a pilot a couple of years ago on what's called opt-out testing in emergency departments where instead of saying i want to test you specifically for HIV we said we test everybody for HIV in this borough yeah are you okay with it and we were finding i think the oldest person we found was a woman of 87 years old, who had absolutely no idea

that she was infected. So it's about normalizing this, it's about getting it out to people. And we think we found some really innovative ways to do that. How's the pilot scheme going to work? So there are two different approaches. One is what's called a direct-to-consumer approach,

because a lot of people either can't find the time or can't get an appointment to get on PrEP. We know that more than half of people who actually want an appointment wait 12 weeks or more, which is not really appropriate when you're thinking about protecting yourself from sex you might be having. And so a direct-to-consumer means that you can do all of it online. You can get the tests that you

need, you can make sure that you're HIV negative, and you can get the medication online. And we think that's going to be very, very appealing to people who either understand PrEP well or who are very nervous about accessing it and the other is linking through women's services, existing women's services like health hubs, antenatal clinics, so that you have a rounded conversation with women about their sexual health. I'm going to bring in Dr Jenny Wheaton. Morning Jenny. Morning. Can we understand how PrEP works? So PrEP works by preventing HIV infection

before it takes hold in the body and it's 99% effective and taken properly. So most times it's a tablet that's taken every day and there are other regimens that may be appropriate as well but yes a really really effective way of preventing HIV transmission. And how long do you need to take it before having sex? So for women, typically you need to take it for seven days before having sex. And then we encourage women to carry on taking it daily over their risk period.

So that might be over a prolonged period of time, or if there are periods in people's lives where they're maybe having sex that's more risky, they would take it a prolonged period of time or if there are periods in people's lives where they're maybe having sex that's more risky they would take it for that that period of time. And can you take it whilst you're on other medication? Absolutely it's a really safe drug to take you can take it when you're on other medication and also when you're pregnant we'd always check those things out in clinic and talk that through with people before starting as well. Why haven't women had access to this? Well partly because the guidelines have all been targeted towards gay men. Most of the effort in terms of

prevention messages has been targeted towards gay men. Women just don't see themselves at risk. There are a lot of women who wouldn't use sexual health services for confidentiality reasons or difficulty in getting an appointment. So I think there's a perception that they aren't at risk. And also, we still have a problem with the medical profession having discussions with women about HIV and their risk of HIV. It still has that connotation about there's something promiscuous about you in the same way that they used to be about the contraceptive pill and so we want to change all of that. Jenny you're you are doing exactly that you're in Brighton where the second pilot has just started and tell us more what the

biggest challenges? Yeah so we're really delighted to be working with EJF on these projects. And as you say, the second project is running across Liverpool, Brighton and Hove and West Sussex. And we're going to be working with Women's Health Hubs and particularly in Liverpool, because they've got a really well established network of women's health hubs in Liverpool to incorporate PrEP into the offer of those services. And Brighton and

Hove will be doing the same across Sussex with Women Health Hub signposting into services. So yeah, it's a really exciting project to be part of. I'm not quite sure I've answered your question though. Please go. Oh no, I was actually thinking, you know, there might be, I'm just wondering about our listeners listening to this who for the first time in years might be thinking about having, hearing a conversation about HIV AIDS and women in particular. What if they're thinking, you know, what if someone is sexually active, sleeping with a few partners, might be concerned for themselves, like who should be coming to you, who should be speaking to their GP? coming to you? Who should be speaking to their GP? Yeah, so anybody who thinks they might be at higher risk of HIV. So everybody can access sexual health services at the moment. They're free at the point of

contact and open access across the country. And if people are worried about PrEP, worried about HIV, then we'd be encouraging them to access PrEP. And that's again what we're going to be doing as part of these projects is raising awareness because unless you know about PrEP then you can't then make those decisions for yourself to access HIV testing and to think about PrEP. What will success look like for this pilot? Success will look like demonstrating that actually these two ways of finding and reaching underserved populations, particularly women, work for them, are effective

and affordable, and ultimately there's a, the government has committed to a new HIV action plan later this year for 2025 to 2030. I would like to see a national prep expansion program in that plan because, you know, we haven't got long. There's a global goal to end AIDS by 2030. The UK actually is the country that's probably closest to achieving that goal. And if we can stop people who are HIV negative becoming infected, we shrink our epidemic

and we can reach that goal and prevention is a huge part of that. So that's what success would look like as well as, obviously, reaching an awful lot of people, especially a lot of women, and giving them a sense of security and safety about their sexual lives. I'd like to thank you both for speaking to me about this. Thanks to Anne Aslett, CEO of the Elton John AIDS Foundation,

and Dr. Jenny Wheaton, consultant and joint clinical lead of sexual health and HIV medicine in Brighton. Thank you. 84844 is the text number. Lots of you getting in touch about whether or not you are the favourite or if you have a favourite in your family. I grew up between two households due to divorced parents and navigated the role of other in each setting. I'm a parent now and favouritism is something I'm hypersensitive to. I don't have a favorite child with two boys three years apart. There's often a child that's calmer and less troublesome while the

other has a mad moment. I read this on social media and it resonated. I don't have a favorite child but there's one I try hard not to wake up. The reason I ask is because of my next guest. There are themes themes may resonate with many of you. The Favourite, it's a new novel from Fran Littlewood, author of New York Times bestselling Amazing Grace Adams. It's set over a single week, but looking at the highs and lows that define a family over decades.

We meet Alex, Eva, and Nancy, three grown-up sisters, each wonderfully and messy in their own individual ways and loved equally by their parents, Vivian and Patrick, or so they thought. Until a family holiday to celebrate their mother's 70th birthday, Patrick accidentally reveals that he has a favourite daughter and causes quite a lot of secrets to come to light. Fran Littlewood, welcome to Woman's Hour. Hello, thank you for having me. Absolute pleasure, so much fun picking this novel,

so many interesting themes. What inspired the notion of a family favorite? A family favorite, oh, I just became obsessed with this idea of a father who inadvertently reveals that he has a favorite. It's just such a huge, juicy taboo to get into. And as you say, it resonates so much with people. When I started pitching this book to friends talking about it in the early stages, immediately my friends would start offloading all their

emotional baggage, all their stuff. And yeah, and as I researched the book, because it's that thing where sort of we're hardwired for parental approval to kind of compete with our siblings for their love, their affection, their attention. And yeah, as I researched, lots of sort of really interesting the science of sibling psychology saying that this is something that pursues us into adulthood. It's like our childhood experiences cast a long shadow. Tell us more. You've done the research. Give me a fact. I think you've put some in the book. Freud said that 70% of fathers say they have a favorite child. Yeah. Well, actually, in the book, I was trying to sort of debunk some of these notions because a

lot of the research is sort of the consensus is that there really is no consensus. But there is some sort of brilliant statistics on birth order, particularly in that kind of, one of the ones that I love is, I'm a middle child myself, I have to kind of flag that. But yes, sort of research into traffic accidents, car accidents, and apparently following a car accident, firstborn and lastborn children tend to call a family member while middle children call a friend. So that's sort of ambivalent attachment and I have a

middle daughter who I've had stern words with about that. Well I wondered about your research because there's three daughters in the book. You have three daughters, your book. You have three daughters, your mother is one of three daughters, your sister has three daughters, so certainly qualified to explore this kind of relationship. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. There is a lot of sister energy in our family, as you say. Yes, I'm one of three sisters, three daughters, my mum has three sisters and a brother, and my older sister, slightly ruining the fairy tale symmetry only has two daughters and a son

But I have to say that I really Watching my my kids kind of growing a growing up with my sisters. I felt compared, you know, not by my Parents I have to say but by family friends by teachers by boyfriends brilliantly Because we came to set as a three and I just saw so many parallels in the way that I saw the kind of scrutiny that my three daughters were facing, particularly on social media, this awful kind of toxic comparison culture and so I sort of wanted to draw a line between the three sisters in this book and this culture of comparison as part of a sort of broad exploration

of womanhood in the book. Comparison and labeling. Absolutely, yeah, yeah, yeah. These sort of scripts that we can't escape, so you kind of, the pretty one, the clever one, the screw up. And again, I tried to sort of overturn some of those stereotypes in the book so that Nancy, the middle child who because she was rather a rebellious teenager and has been sort of tarred with this sort of brush, this is her script, she's a screw up even though she's a successful doctor, but actually all of the sisters are sort of perfectly imperfect in their own ways. Tell us about them, there's Alex, Nancy and Eva described. Would you describe them?

Are they close? So, yes, they are close and they're sort of, they're close in age as well. So Alex, the oldest, she is sort of the keeper of the family flame and actually statistically, there is a slight sort of uplift in the oldest children being this keeper of the family flame that tend to subscribe to their parents' worldview. So Alex is the one, they're off

on holiday in this remote glass house, an exquisite glass house, and she's the one, three generations of the family, but she's the one sort of wandering around picking up, you know, the damp bikini that's been left on the kitchen counter and the socks that are on the sofa. So she is really sort of trapped in this role, but she goes on a rather fabulous journey. She goes on the biggest journey. She throws off the shackles. She does. Don't be a martyr, Alec. But this fabulous house where they're all staying together has been paid for by the youngest, Eva. Tell us about Eva. So Eva is this, she's invented a dice game at her kitchen table and she's become a multimillionaire. So obviously she's very wealthy, she's paid

as you say for the house and the siblings adore each other but also there's that irritations and that's you know it is a bit of an issue that comes in at times. Would you read from the book? Yes, wonderful. So this is a flashback to autumn 1989. Nancy, the middle sister, and Eva, the youngest are at secondary school. Nancy's late coming out of school and has spotted Eva at the bus stop being bullied by two girls from the same, from the year above. Nancy's aware of an old lady wheeling a tartan shopping trolley past the bus stop.

She can feel something like sparks popping behind her eyes as she stands there, holding herself back. She waits until the woman has moved further on the pavement, then, putting her body between the girls and her sister, she leans in close, makes her voice low. You touch my sister again, I'll come after you, OK? She smiles, a smile that isn't. Then she jerks her head to the side, as if she's headbutting thin air, a blunt nod in the direction of the street. As soon as they've gone, she wraps an arm around Eva's shoulders. She feels strangely emptied out, a little bit weak in her arms and legs,

like she needs to sit down, the same feeling she gets when she skips breakfast. Clicking the side of her mouth she gives her sister a kind of half hug. I could totally get a part in EastEnders, she says. Eva leans into her just for a second. Her head fits under Nancy's chin and when Nancy breathes in she can smell the impulse body spray her little sister has started wearing these past couple of months. Gypsy it's called and it lingers in the bathroom in the hall in the kitchen long after Eva's left a room. There's the cringiest ad campaign for it and it's an absolute gift just too good to pass up so that Nancy and Alex have taken to following their sister around the house, quoting it in silky milk tray voices. When a man you've never met before suddenly gives you

flowers, don't be alarmed. Then laughing and laughing as they choke out the punch line, infecting each other because they can't help it, he's only acting on impulse. affecting each other because they can't help it. He's only acting on impulse. Thanks, Nance. Eva whispers now. You're welcome, Nancy tells her. And she checks over her shoulder, sees the red bulk of the number four coming up the road.

But you're not sitting next to me on the bus. Brilliant, brilliantly observed. Every sibling knows that experience. You became an author in your 40s, you did an MA in creative writing and then your debut became a best-selling novel, Amazing Grace Adams, published in 17 countries and a remarkable achievement. Thank you, yes it was quite sort of very, very insane. I, you know, there's so much luck in it, I think, and I managed to get this sort of rock star US editor,

and it was chosen for, there's an NBC reading group. It's sort of like Oprah and Reese, but it's Jenna Bush Hager, who is daughter and granddaughter of Bush. And that, your first book, it traces a single day in the life of a 45 year old perimenopausal woman, what a brilliant premise. And even in your new book, you don't shy away

from what are seen as taboo subjects. We get into the lives of these women, and you really go there with how they're feeling about their husbands and their children. Yeah, yeah, thank you. I really, I mean, it's something I try to be a bit of a truth teller in my books and writing into those ugly spaces, the places that people don't want to go and I think it's a really tricky thing with siblings and especially, you know, I'm one of three siblings,

you're kind of, you're mindful but these experiences seem to be, you know, so universal. There's the kind of universe in the particular and yes. And lots of people are going to enjoy it and find it very relatable and also congratulations on Amazing Grace Adams being optioned for TV. Yes, yeah. Very exciting. By the producer of Mare of Easttown, yes. I know, that's huge.

We're very excited about that. Will you come back and tell us all about it when it's cast? Absolutely. Fran Littlewood, thank you so much. I want to end with a few of these messages coming in about favouritism. So as someone who says, I want to describe my personal benefit of not being the family favourite. My twin brother, we're now in our seventies, recently said, I used to be the family favourite,

but I'm nobody's favourite now. Such pathos. He still lives in our original home in Wolverhampton. While I escaped from a lack of positive affirmations, moved away and now I live in a beautiful coastal town where I'm very involved with my son and his family and I've made a host of friends. Would this have happened if I'd been the family favourite? Exactly, favouritism has its consequences. In my case, good ones. Thanks for listening. Join me tomorrow.

That's all for today's Woman's Hour, join us again next time. for prostitution. He denies all the charges. I'll be bringing you every twist and turn from the courtroom with the BBC's correspondents and our expert guests. So make sure you listen, subscribe now on BBC Sounds and turn your push notifications on so you never miss a thing. I'm Andini and I'm looking back on the life of a Hollywood icon whose legacy lives on through more than just her film roles. She was someone who was interested in invention all her life. She wasn't that interested in the film that she was supposed to be starring in. She was much more interested in the latest invention that she was working on.

Who developed an idea so revolutionary that it's still being used today. Frequency hopping. It was used for secure military communications. It's in GPS, it's in Wi-Fi, it's in Bluetooth. From the BBC World Service, Untold Legends, Hedy Lamarr. Available now, wherever you get your BBC podcasts.