Here is an interview with Butch I had the honor to record just a few months ago in San Francisco. This will be part of the National AIDS Memorial's documentary series "Surviving Voices" that will premiere later in 2026. We sped through the editing process to make the interview available asap. Feel free to share.

What an extraordinary human Butch was. Rest in peace, my friend.  

I met Butch through our Thursday night Zoom writing group. I met him in real life at Positive Living in 2024 ~ I wrote him a poem: 

Heart

he brough into every room.

Posting comments on the HIV Memorial Page

daily, and sometimes for hours.

His goal, to write on every post,

a message for everyone lost.

They all mattered.

Heart

An ally

who continued to stand by

diving his heart into more positive people.

Positive connections.

Some burn out,

Butch just burned brighter.

With each breath he took in

of other’s traumas and stories.

Everyone mattered and deserved to be seen,

heard, their life’s journey deserved to be known

and kept alive.

Like the tide rolling in.

His eyes sparkled like

golden hours sunlight

reflecting off ocean waves.

Twinkling forever

among the thousands

awaiting his glow’s return

into their energy.

The loves and friends

He lost long ago

Countless souls he never even met

touched from afar

also line up to greet him.

I’m honored to have met him

We connected with cirrhosis trauma.

Having watched it’s horrors first hand,

knowing the pain and symptoms it brings.

I watched it consume someone I loved,

but Butch’s sparkling smile

always showed up Thursday nights.

Ooh Butch

you are the forever sunset.

Those cute dimples will be missed

however, your love and impacts will remain.

Brooke Davidoff ~ 

It is with deep respect, gratitude, and affection that the HIV Vaccine Trials Network honors the life and legacy of our longtime friend and colleague, Community Advisory Board member Butch McKay, who passed away Friday, January 30, 2026. Butch was one of the most outspoken, motivated, and unwavering advocates for people living with and affected by HIV. His commitment to this work spanned more than five decades, and his impact on our community is immeasurable.

Butch began working with us long before we were known as the HIV Vaccine Trials Network. In 1989, Butch became involved as a Community Advisory Board member at the University of Alabama at Birmingham clinical research site working with the ACTG. He became involved with HIV vaccines when the site joined AVEG, which would eventually become the HVTN in 1999. Over the years, he played a vital role in shaping the Network’s community and ethical foundations. He served on the Global CAB, the Ethics Working Group, the Scientific Steering Committee, and the Network Evaluation Committee. He also represented the HVTN on Community Partners, convened by the Office of HIV/AIDS Network Coordination (HANC). During his tenure as chair of the HVTN’s Ethics Working Group, the HVTN became the first group in the National Institutes of Health to have a Participants Bill of Rights, created and adopted in 2003, an enduring reflection of his belief in dignity, transparency, and the power of community. This document subsequently evolved as the Participants Bill of Rights and Responsibilities, with versions for HIV vaccine, TB vaccine, broadly neutralizing antibody, and analytical treatment interruption trials. In 2019, HANC worked to further evolve the document as the Bill of Rights and Responsibilities for HIV Research, adopted by all 4 DAIDS-funded research networks. Butch was the first author on a poster presentation describing this effort at the AIDS Vaccine 2007 conference held in Seattle, WA.

We knew Butch as a CAB member we could always rely on for honest insights, for timely updates, for review of protocols and other Network initiatives, and for a fierce, compassionate commitment to ending HIV and involving communities in research. His presence strengthened our work, and his leadership helped move the field forward. The HVTN recognized Butch for his extraordinary leadership with the Octavio Valente, Jr. Award for Volunteer Service in 2008, and he continued his active involvement in our work to the present.

To Butch, we say thank you—for your decades of service, your courage, your voice, and your heart. You brought us closer to a reality without HIV, and we are profoundly grateful.

We miss you, Butch. We will carry your legacy forward and continue the fight to end HIV. We send our condolences to the staff and volunteers of the clinical research site at the University of Alabama-Birmingham who had worked with him most closely for so many years.

We were Facebook friends for several years… and I admired you and your passion for supporting AIDS-related topics and causes. You inspired as I admired your passion and dedication!

Rest in peace my friend 

Butch was a kind and selfless Helper. Butch helped others and asked for nothing in return. He taught me and so many others that Love is Powerful. That empathy is Powerful. That Loving others and having empathy for others can never be wrong.

Butch taught me a lot more about loving and caring for people than I learned in church. Butch has thousands of friends and people who love him, all throughout this world... for a reason. Each one of the people who love and will miss Butch dearly have felt his love, that radiated from him. 

Butch taught me that the best possible thing I could do with my time on this 🌎 is to spend it helping others. 

It was an honor to call you my Friend and my ManReach Brother.  

We will miss you. A life well lived and a job well done, Sir!