Madonna Gives Powerful Speech for World AIDS Day: 'I Watched So Many People Die'

"I want you to recognize how lucky you are right now to be alive!"

It was a powerful statement coming from Madonna, who nearly died earlier this year from a bacterial infection. She was reminding her fans to be grateful for what they have in the context of a show-stopping speech about AIDS.

With these and other fiery words, the 65-year-old icon commemorated World AIDS Day during her Celebration tour stop in Amsterdam Friday. The LGBTQ+ icon spoke from the heart about the insidious rise of the disease in the early '80s in NYC, where she had just moved to find herself and launch her career.

"When I first came to New York, I was lucky enough to eventually meet and become friends with so many amazing artists, musicians, painters, singers, dancers, the list goes on and on... writers," she recalled. "And then one day, people started getting sick, and nobody could understand what was happening... People were dropping like flies."

Underscoring how hard it was to be openly gay in the '80s, she angrily remembered medical professionals who did not care about "gay cancer," believing those who had it "deserved to die."

"I personally lost so many friends, so many loved ones, I would've cut off my arms if I could've found a cure for them to live," she said, her voice breaking with emotion. "I watched so many people die."

Remembering her close friend and roommate Martin Burgoyne, an up-and-coming artist who died at 23 in 1986, she went on, "I watched my very best friend, Martin, die. I was holding his hand. He was suffering so much; he could barely breathe. He wanted me to play Maria Callas... And I did. And I said, 'Please, Martin, let go.' And I watched his spirit leave his body."

Burgoyne is just one of the faces used in the singer's "Live to Tell" performance on the tour, which is a collaboration with the Instagram account The AIDS Memorial.

Watch her whole speech here.

The Celebration tour wraps in Europe with a sixth London show on December 6, then begins its North American leg in Brooklyn on December 13. It comes to an end in Mexico on April 26, 2024.