From root@aspensys.com Fri May 12 06:41:55 1995 Received: from qrd.rdrop.com (qrd.rdrop.com [199.2.210.245]) by abacus.oxy.edu (8.6.10/8.6.11) with ESMTP id GAA06183 for ; Fri, 12 May 1995 06:41:44 -0700 Received: from casti.com (vector.casti.com [204.91.98.64]) by qrd.rdrop.com (8.6.9/8.6.9) with ESMTP id GAA25777 for ; Fri, 12 May 1995 06:25:21 -0700 Received: from aspensys by casti.com (8.6.9/NX3.0M) id JAA02583; Fri, 12 May 1995 09:41:36 -0400 Received: by aspensys (5.0/SMI-SVR4) id AA16280; Fri, 12 May 1995 09:40:18 +0500 Date: Fri, 12 May 1995 09:40:18 +0500 Message-Id: <9505121312.AA12664@aspensys> Errors-To: martha_vander_kolk@smtpinet.aspensys.com Reply-To: aidsnews@aspensys.com Originator: aidsnews@cdcnac.aspensys.com Sender: aidsnews@aspensys.com Precedence: bulk From: ghmcleaf{CONTRACTOR/ASPEN/ghmcleaf}%NAC-GATEWAY.ASPEN@ace.aspensys.com To: qrd@vector.casti.com Subject: CDC AIDS Daily Summary 05/12/95 X-Listprocessor-Version: 6.0c -- ListProcessor by Anastasios Kotsikonas X-Comment: CDC National AIDS Clearinghouse Content-Length: 10067 X-Lines: 190 Status: RO AIDS Daily Summary May 12, 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 ************************************************************ "What's News: U.S. Officials" "Staff Found to Fill Gaps at AIDS Clinic" "Overhaul for AIDS Effort" "Worker with AIDS Sues Bell Atlantic" "Administration Unveils Proposal to Cut 2,400 HHS Jobs in 5 Years" "AIDS Challenges Road Deaths as Killer in Italy" "Across the USA: Rhode Island" "Tried to Warn People of Plot, Former Tan Confidante Says" "Anomaly Admitted in 'First' AIDS Case" "HIV-1 Subtypes and Male-to-Female Transmission in Thailand" ************************************************************ "What's News: U.S. Officials" Wall Street Journal (05/12/95) P. A1 In a surprise move, U.S. officials have ended the anonymous testing of newborns for HIV. The cancellation of the HIV testing was announced at a congressional hearing shortly before a congressman urged Congress to require authorities to inform all mothers of the results of the tests, which have been conducted anonymously in 45 states since 1988. Related Stories: Washington Times (05/12) P. A12; Philadelphia Inquirer (05/12) P. A29; Baltimore Sun (05/12) P. 25A "Staff Found to Fill Gaps at AIDS Clinic" Washington Post (05/12/95) P. C2; Goldstein, Amy At the request of Washington, D.C., Mayor Marion Barry, D.C. General Hospital has temporarily reassigned physicians to work in it AIDS clinic. As of today, a specialist in infectious diseases and two general internists with AIDS experience will join the clinic, filling a void left last week when two of the clinic's three physicians quit. Hospital officials say they are trying to recruit replacements, a task that some believe will be difficult. The AIDS clinic treats 800 low-income patients, many of whom are in the advanced stages of AIDS. Related Story: Washington Times (05/12) P. C6 "Overhaul for AIDS Effort" Financial Times (05/12/95) P. 4; Williams, Frances Prompted by donor fatigue and confusing AIDS initiatives, six international organizations will co-sponsor a single United Nations (UN) agency to spearhead the global AIDS effort. The Joint UN Programme on AIDS (UNAIDS) will be completely operational by January 1996. UNAIDS--which will be financed by the World Health Organization (WHO), the World Bank, and various UN agencies--will have fewer employees and less money than the programs it will replace, including the WHO AIDS program. Dr. Peter Piot, executive director of UNAIDS, said this week that the change was inevitable because donor countries most affected by AIDS had become fed up by different agencies promoting their own programs and giving conflicting policy advice. Piot's goal is "to make UNAIDS a more efficient, more client-friendly programme." Piot is hoping for an annual budget of about $70 million, approximately the same as the current WHO AIDS budget. There are fears, however, that the program will find itself underfunded, particularly if the United States is forced by Congress to make drastic reductions in its payments to the UN. "Worker with AIDS Sues Bell Atlantic" Baltimore Sun (05/12/95) P. 12C; Dresser, Michael An employee of Bell Atlantic Corp. who has AIDS has sued the company, alleging that it has violated federal pension law and the Americans with Disabilities Act by refusing to cash out her disability pension. Tema S. Gerhardt, who has worked for the company since 1979, says she was diagnosed with HIV in 1987 but continued to work until her illness forced her to go on disability last June. Gerhardt, formerly Tema Luft, became well-known in the Baltimore area in the late 1980s after she became one of the first women in the United States to publicly disclose that she had contracted HIV through heterosexual sex. Gerhardt is joined in the suit by her husband, the executive vice president of Local 2100 of the Communications Workers of America (CWA), which represents Bell Atlantic employees. The suit claims that Bell Atlantic agreed during 1992 negotiations with CWA to let employees retire in 1994 and 1995 and take their disability and other pensions as a lump sum instead of monthly payments. Bell Atlantic later changed the policy to exclude the disability pensions from the cash-out option, which violates the company's collective bargaining with CWA and illegally treats disabled people differently from other employees, the lawsuit claims. "Administration Unveils Proposal to Cut 2,400 HHS Jobs in 5 Years" Washington Post (On Thursday, Vice President Al Gore and Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Donna E. Shalala announced that HHS intends to reduce its work force by 2,400 jobs over five years. The proposal, which is part of Gore's plan to "reinvent government," would save $453 million by the year 2000. Shalala said that current employees would not lose their jobs; positions would be eliminated only after a worker quits or retires. One part of the plan would consolidate 107 health grant, training, and service programs in several Public Health Service agencies into five "performance partnership grants." These partnership grants would include AIDS services, mental health, substance abuse, and immunizations.) P. A23; Rich, Spencer "AIDS Challenges Road Deaths as Killer in Italy" Reuters (05/12/95) According to Italy's statistics institute ISTAT, AIDS is becoming as big a killer in Italy as road accidents. An estimated 4,370 Italians died from AIDS last year, compared to some 6,000 deaths on the roads, ISTAT's annual report said. "For young males aged between 18 and 29 AIDS has become the second cause of death after road accidents, overtaking drugs," the report noted. In 1992, the last year for which statistics are available, road accidents caused 35 percent of deaths among males in that age group. AIDS was the second largest cause of death, with 9.9 percent of deaths attributed to the disease. ISTAT estimated that the number of HIV-infected Italians was at least 100,000. "Across the USA: Rhode Island" USA Today (05/12/95) P. 12A Under legislation passed by the Rhode Island House, most convicted sex offenders would be required to be tested for HIV and to give the results to their victims. The bill now goes to the Senate. "Tried to Warn People of Plot, Former Tan Confidante Says" Toronto Globe and Mail (05/11/95) P. A4; Feschuk, Scott Rachel Deitch--Marilyn Tan's former best friend--testified on Wednesday that she tried to warn several people that Tan was planning to inject her lover with HIV-infected blood, but that no one believed her. Deitch said she considered warning Conrad Boland, the target of Tan's plot, but did not because she was afraid he would not believe her because he did not like her. Under cross-examination, Deitch said she eventually told Boland that he had twice been injected with tainted blood because she feared for her life. She said she was afraid that Tan's sister, who supplied the infected blood, would kill her because Deitch knew that Tan had injected Boland in April and June of 1992. This trial marks the first time in North America that anyone has been charged with injecting a person with HIV-infected blood. "Anomaly Admitted in 'First' AIDS Case" Nature (05/04/95) 375, No. 6526, P. 4; Masood, Ehsan The identification of the world's first AIDS patient as a 25-year-old apprentice printer who died in Britain in 1959 has recently been called into question. In a co-authored letter to The Lancet, Gerald Corbitt--director of clinical virology at the Manchester Royal Infirmary--admitted he knew that his results may have been anomalous, even at the time of analysis. He also acknowledged that he was aware in 1992 that the apprentice could not have died of AIDS because the HIV detected in tissue samples in 1990 were from "a relatively modern strain." When asked why he failed to publish his doubts about the findings sooner, and thus clarify the confusion over the identity of the first AIDS case, Corbitt said he saw no reason to do so. Corbitt claimed that his original 1990 letter to The Lancet was not intended as "a peer-reviewed article" on the origin of AIDS. He said the apprentice's tissue was analyzed only "to see whether we could use PCR [polymerase chain reaction] on archival material." "HIV-1 Subtypes and Male-to-Female Transmission in Thailand" Lancet (04/29/95) Vol. 345, No. 8957, P. 1078; Kunanusont, Chaiyos; Foy, Hjordis M.; Kreiss, Joan K. et al. In a case-control study, Kunanusont et al. studied the risk factors for heterosexual transmission of HIV among couples in Thailand. Of the 90 HIV-infected men and their partners who were enrolled at the immune clinic of Chulalongkorn Hospital, 92 percent of the male index cases were infected with HIV-1 serotype A (subtype E). Most of the index cases were acquired through heterosexual sex. Of the 95 couples who were enrolled at various detoxification clinics, 79 percent were infected with HIV-1 serotype B (subtype B). The majority of these males had acquired HIV through intravenous drug use. Overall, the HIV seroconcordance level was significantly higher in the immune clinic than in the drug clinics. The rate was also much higher among couples in which the male was infected with serotype A, compared to serotype B. According to the authors, the findings indicate that HIV-1 subtype E may be linked to a higher risk of heterosexual transmission than subtype B. If this is true, they conclude, subtype E's predominance in Thailand may have advanced the spread of the virus.