Date: Tue, 5 Dec 1995 10:13:29 +0500 From: ghmcleaf{CONTRACTOR/ASPEN/ghmcleaf}%NAC-GATEWAY.ASPEN@ace.aspensys.com Subject: CDC AIDS Daily Summary 12/05/95 AIDS Daily Summary December 5, 1995 The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) National AIDS Clearinghouse makes available the following information as a public service only. Providing this information does not constitute endorsement by the CDC, the CDC Clearinghouse, or any other organization. Reproduction of this text is encouraged; however, copies may not be sold, and the CDC Clearinghouse should be cited as the source of this information. Copyright 1995, Information, Inc., Bethesda, MD ************************************************************ "Abbott Labs Plans Lottery to Give Away AIDS Drug" "Man Charged in Needle Case Fled Hospital" "Judge Frees Check Forger Who Has AIDS" "As Larger Cities Gain Ground on Ills, Smaller Ones Lose" "Nationline: Shooting Spree" "50 Calvert High Students Test Positive for TB Germ" "A Howl of Anger" "Eurocourt Tells France to Pay AIDS Victim, Now Dead" "AIDS Watch: Drug Research Slows" "Shopping for Life" ************************************************************ "Abbott Labs Plans Lottery to Give Away AIDS Drug" Wall Street Journal (12/05/95) P. B6 More than 2,000 advanced AIDS patients across the world will receive free doses of Abbott Laboratories' new experimental drug ritonavir by participating in a lottery, the company said. Specific details of the program will be made available to patient-advocacy organizations and to physicians who treat people with AIDS. Only limited amounts of the protease inhibitor will be available, Abbott said, because of the "extraordinarily difficult manufacturing process" involved. AIDS advocacy groups have beseeched protease-inhibitor makers to provide the drug prior to receiving U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval because some late-stage AIDS patients could otherwise die, but until now, Abbott has maintained that it needed all of its supply of ritonavir for clinical tests. Related Stories: Washington Post (12/05) P. A10; New York Times (12/05) P. C6; Washington Times (12/05) P. A10 "Man Charged in Needle Case Fled Hospital" New York Times (12/05/95) P. B1; Sexton, Joe Law enforcement officials and a spokesman for the New York State Office of Mental Health report that a homeless man who is accused of stabbing a child with a hypodermic needle on the subway last week ran away from a psychiatric hospital in 1993. When Angel Coro disappeared from the Rochester Psychiatric Hospital after six years, he was identified as an escapee who was a danger to both himself and others. Coro has now been arrested and charged with jabbing a hypodermic needle into the leg of six-year-old Colete Lopez. The girl has been given shots to fight possible infection from tuberculosis and hepatitis, and will be screened today for HIV infection. The New York City Medical Examiner's office has not yet determined whether or not the needle was contaminated. Prosecutors have charged Coro, who was ordered to undergo psychiatric examination, with second-degree assault. Related Story: USA Today (12/05) P. 3A "Judge Frees Check Forger Who Has AIDS" Washington Post (12/05/95) P. B3; Bates, Steve A federal judge released an AIDS patient who pleaded guilty Monday to cashing some $250,000 in bad checks, noting that federal sentencing guidelines do not take into account criminals who have the disease. "I don't have to tell this defendant the future he faces," said U.S. District Judge Albert V. Bryan Jr. The Alexandria, Va. judge reduced Kerry Shotsberger's sentence to the 17 months that he has already served in prison cells and hospitals. Court documents show that Shotsberger and his co-defendant, Dennis Stokes, used computers and blank check forms to make phony payroll checks, allegedly collecting nearly $260,000 before being arrested last year. Stokes was scheduled for sentencing Monday as well, but was quarantined for tuberculosis and AIDS. "As Larger Cities Gain Ground on Ills, Smaller Ones Lose" New York Times (12/05/95) P. B10; Janofsky, Michael Although such problems as violent crime, infant mortality, and the spread of HIV have started to subside in the country's largest cities, they are growing in smaller cities, according to a new report from the nonprofit National Public Health and Hospital Institute. The report is based on census data, federal crime statistics, and health-care surveys from the United States' 100 largest cities. Dennis P. Andrulis, the institute's president, noted that several of the largest cities had found answers to difficult problems out of desperation, and that their methods should be considered by smaller cities with similar issues. The report, for example, showed that Cleveland's health officials had made significant inroads in fighting the spread of tuberculosis, gonorrhea, and HIV. The report also found that smaller cities struggling to cope with one problem, did not always experience others as severely. In El Paso, for instance, there were no appreciable improvements in poverty rates between 1980 and 1990, but during that same decade, the city became the leader among the largest cities in its rate of AIDS prevention. "Nationline: Shooting Spree" USA Today (12/05/95) P. 3A; Leavitt, Paul; Rivera, Patricia V.; Goodwin, M. David In San Antonio on Sunday, 22-year-old Ulysses Miller entered the home of a woman he said had given him AIDS and shot five individuals, killing two, police report. Miller then killed himself as well. An autopsy will determine whether he was infected with HIV. "50 Calvert High Students Test Positive for TB Germ" Washington Post (12/05/95) P. B5; Shields, Todd Health officials in Calvert County, Md., discovered 50 students carrying the bacterium that causes tuberculosis (TB), after learning that one student at the crowded Calvert High School had the disease. However, none of the 50 has either developed TB or is contagious, health officials said Monday. An initial screening in May identified 19 people with the bacterium, while a second one in September located an additional 31. County health officer David Rogers said there was no way to determine how many of the initial 19 infections were the result of contact with the original case, but added that the remaining 31 were likely caused by such contact. "A Howl of Anger" Los Angeles Times--Washington Edition (12/05/95) P. B9; Levine, Bettijane Author Elinor Burkett sees little sense in what she calls the AIDS industry, a combination of specific doctors, politicians, federal research scientists, drug companies, and others she believes have cashed in, copped out, been misled, or succumbed to greed in the fight against HIV. In her new book, "The Gravest Show on Earth," Burkett presents a series of complaints against nearly every group involved with the epidemic. She admits that it is not so much a book, but as a "howl of venom, hysteria, fury, and desperation." Her objective, she says, was only to tell the truth and voice her objections to the continuing errors in the battle against HIV and AIDS. "Eurocourt Tells France to Pay AIDS Victim, Now Dead" Reuters (12/04/95) The European Court of Human Rights ordered France to pay Daniel Bellet, a hemophiliac who died of AIDS 11 days ago, damages totaling more than $200,000. The Strasbourg-based court said Monday that Bellet was denied his right to access to an appeals court in his legal battles against the national blood bank for being given an HIV-contaminated transfusion in 1983. Three years ago, Bellet was also awarded $260,000 in HIV-infection compensation from the French government. Monday's ruling was the fourth instance in which the European Court of Human Rights has ruled against France in HIV-related cases filed by hemophiliacs. "AIDS Watch: Drug Research Slows" Men's Fitness (11/95) Vol. 11, No. 11, P. 28 According to a federal advisory panel, drug makers have cut back on their AIDS drug research and development endeavors. The slowdown is partly due to pharmaceutical companies who see no potential for profit in continuing research, circumspect investors, and a reduction in government support. The panel suggested providing companies dedicated to AIDS research with tax cuts and other economic incentives. "Shopping for Life" Advocate (11/28/95) No. 695, P. 35; Foster, R. Daniel Unlike any other disease, AIDS has inspired a wave of specialty items and merchandise tie-ins. It is also the only disease to have its own gift shop. San Francisco's Under One Roof, which only features products which carry a red ribbon or other symbol, sells merchandise from 60 Northern California AIDS organizations and donates 100 percent of its profits to the war against AIDS. Although some complain that such items trivialize and sentimentalize the disease while making it marketable, others caution against such broad generalizations. Daniel Wolfe, a spokesman for Gay Men's Health Crisis, observes that these products can be considered "useful stand-ins" or "shorthand" for a stigmatized illness that is difficult for the general public to face. Still, some wonder if AIDS merchandise is a facile substitute for action. A customer at Under One Roof said, "I think people in this country equate shopping with doing something. The more we shop, the more control we have--over AIDS and over a lot of other things."