Stephen Karpiak, whose research into the lives of New Yorkers aging with H.I.V. revealed a scarcity of support networks and high rates of depression, leading to changes in the care of older people living with the virus, died on Oct.
16 at a hospital in Manhattan. He was 74. His brother, Michael, said the cause was kidney damage that resulted from an infection.
AIDS had a devastating impact on gay men in the 1980s, especially in New York. The advent of antiretroviral drugs in the 1990s marked the beginning of a hopeful shift, and a decade later, after an era of despair, gay life reclaimed its vibrancy in the city.
But Dr. Karpiak at the time was starting to conduct research about older adults living with H.I.V. and he was troubled by what he.