Dua Lipa has said she is ‘surprised and horrified’ at comments made about gay men and HIV by the rapper DaBaby, who collaborated with the singer on her chart-topping hit ‘Levitating’.

While performing at the Rolling Loud festival in Miami over the weekend, DaBaby – whose real name is Jonathan Lyndale Kirk – went on a rant where he made certain comments about gay men and people living with HIV.

The rapper told the crowd to hold their phone lights up in the air unless they had ‘HIV, Aids or any sexually transmitted diseases’ or were men who were having sexual experiences with other men ‘in car parks’.

The 29-year-old rapper also made the – dangerous and stigma-perpetuating – false claim that being HIV positive will ‘leave you dead in 2-3 weeks’. People with HIV can now expect to live a normal life thanks to huge advances in medication.

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Following the publication of the comments, Lipa issued a statement distancing herself from the rapper and re-iterating her allyship to the LGBTQ+ community.

‘I’m surprised and horrified at DaBaby’s comments,’ Lipa wrote in an Instagram Story posted on July 27. ‘I really don’t recognize this as the person I worked with.’

Instagram: @dualipa

Lipa said she knows her fans ‘know where my heart lies’ and that she stands with the LGBTQ+ community and urged followers to ‘come together to fight the stigma and ignorance around HIV/Aids.’

On July 28, a day after Lipa’s statement, DaBaby backtracked on his comments after initially defending them in recent days. In a tweet, the rapper said he apologized to anyone offended by his ‘insensitive’ comments.

This story originally appeared on ELLE UK

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