A fearless and compassionate advocate for HIV/Aids awareness and care in the 1980s, who was recognised as Nurse of the Year, also won recognition for his work in addiction services and the prison system.

Russ Ford, who trained in Jamaica as a nurse, became a leading force in the launch of Agape House, the island’s only hospice.

He was a senior nursing officer in Bermuda’s prisons and a probation officer. He worked in mental health and helped people battling substance abuse, while working in addiction services at St Brendan’s Hospital, the precursor to the Mid-Atlantic Wellness Institute.

In January 2023, Mr Ford was seriously injured in a fall at home that left him partially paralysed and facing tremendous medical bills — a personal crisis followed swiftly by an outpouring of fundraising across a grateful community.

Grateful in return, he said: “I am just taken aback. I know that Bermudians are so generous but for me to have received this help has been wonderful.”

His charity was also international, when Mr Ford joined family and fellow volunteers to serve a community in Ghana.

As a founder of Supportive Therapy for Aids persons and their Relatives, or Star, Mr Ford put himself at the forefront of HIV in Bermuda, not merely in providing therapy but changing attitudes as the island’s cases went into the hundreds.

In the early days, he faced hostility from some in the community.

In 1986, when the Star charity began, HIV was relatively new to the island and little understood, with scant treatment options.

Its early association with homosexuality and intravenous drug use occasionally brought condemnation and discrimination.

Mr Ford said many in the community failed to heed his message that HIV posed a risk to all rather than some — even as he emphasised that it could be prevented and treated.

He recalled that stigma in a 2015 interview with The Royal Gazette, highlighting that the island’s records were “not really accurate” in showing its actual toll.

He explained: “Many persons went overseas for treatment — or, if they died, the cause of death was not put down as Aids; it was put down as pneumonia or some other related illness.

“When you consider the amount of discrimination and stigma attached to it, I can understand why people would do that. Particularly living in Bermuda and it being such a closed society.

“Everybody knows everybody, so you reap consequences of disclosing that information and as much as you want to be open and honest about it, the consequences are so real that people refuse to — so I can understand from that perspective.”

At the time Mr Ford founded the Star Foundation with Christina Anderson, the high mortality rate from HIV meant the island needed a hospice — leading to the establishment of Agape House.

Initially the creation of an Aids hospice triggered alarm from a community still lagging in its understanding of HIV.

Ultimately, Star teamed up with King Edward VII Memorial Hospital. Agape House launched in 1990 from its property in Paget, inside an old Bermuda cottage that once served as a doctors’ residence.

Mr Ford, who also spoke for the Prison Officers Association, became the first male nurse in the prison system in 1991.

He led a comprehensive update of healthcare behind bars, including a smoking ban that saw asthma admission plummet, and a boost in optical, dental and podiatry treatments for inmates.

He was promoted to senior nursing officer in 2004, leaving him responsible for some 350 inmates.

In 2014, when Mr Ford retired, Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Lamb, who was Commissioner of Corrections, praised him as “a man of impeccable integrity and character” who worked tirelessly for others.

Tributes to Mr Ford were opened in the House of Assembly today by opposition MP Robin Tucker.

Michael Weeks, a Government MP, called Mr Ford “a true advocate and champion for the less fortunate among us”. Backbencher Dennis Lister III told the House that Mr Ford was “going to leave a lasting legacy with his work”.

Russ Allan Ford, a top nurse, probation officer and tireless activist in securing compassion and treatment for HIV patients, was born on March 23, 1959. He died in September 2026