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First, participants described \u201caccomplished normalization\u201d: HIV was narrated as clinically stable and increasingly comparable to other age-related conditions, supported by simplified ART routines and routinized follow-up care. Second, normalization was \u201cdisrupted\u201d and at times actively contested, through stigma encounters, disclosure dilemmas, and especially sexuality and intimacy reactivated HIV as exceptional despite biomedical control. Third, participants articulated \u201cdiscursive undetectability\u201d: viral suppression was experienced as a biomedical achievement, yet many perceived declining public and professional knowledge about contemporary HIV, producing renewed fear, misrecognition, and incentives to conceal serostatus. The findings suggest that later-life HIV is characterized by an ambivalent coexistence of clinical normalization and social exceptionalism, and that meaningful normalization requires sustained public education and recognition alongside pharmaceutical efficacy.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1177\/13634593261469818","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,29]],"date-time":"2026-07-29T10:35:27Z","timestamp":1785321327000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1177\/sage-journals-update-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["Accomplished normalization, enduring exceptionalism: Aging with HIV in the era of antiretroviral treatment"],"prefix":"10.1177","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-6813-9322","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Tony","family":"Sandset","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"University of Oslo, Norway"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"179","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,29]]},"reference":[{"key":"e_1_3_5_2_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Bayer R (1991) Public Health Policy and the AIDS epidemic. 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