Subject: CDC AIDS Daily Summary 10/23/96
From: "Flynn Mclean" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 Oct 1996 10:06:38 -0400

AIDS Daily Summary 
                      October 23, 1996
     
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 National AIDS 
Clearinghouse, or any other organization. Reproduction of this 
text is encouraged; however, copies may not be sold, and the CDC 
National AIDS Clearinghouse should be cited as the source of this 
information. Copyright 1996, Information, Inc., Bethesda, MD

******************************************************
"Blacks Urged to Act to Increase Awareness of the AIDS Epidemic" 
"Helping Kids With HIV"
"Study of Access to Medical Care Finds Outlook Remains Grim for 
Uninsured"
"USA Snapshots: AIDS in the Workplace" 
"ADA's Miseries and Accommodations"
"Survey: Congress Hopefuls Lean to Drug Prevention"
"HIV Perinatal Transmission Risk Not Affected by Infection 
Outcome of Previous Siblings"
"New Surveillance Tool Introduced for Global Monitoring of HIV-1 
Variants"
"Here's the Straight Dope"
"A Reluctant Campaigner"
******************************************************
     
"Blacks Urged to Act to Increase Awareness of the AIDS Epidemic" 
New York Times (10/23/96) P. A16; Rimer, Sara
     Black leaders representing government, academia, religion,
and medicine met Tuesday at Harvard University to urge 
African-Americans to take action against the spread of HIV.  
Henry Louis Gates, chairman of Afro-American studies at Harvard, 
told the group that "our people, our leaders, our culture, have 
long been in denial about AIDS in the black community."  The 
Harvard AIDS Institute estimated that more than half of all U.S. 
AIDS cases would be among blacks by the year 2000.  By that time, 
the institute said, a Black person would be nine times as likely 
to have AIDS as someone who is not Black.  Institute member Mario 
Cooper said that all levels of government, as well as charitable 
organizations, must be more active in making AIDS-fighting 
resources available to Blacks.
     
"Helping Kids With HIV"
Washington Post (10/23/96) P. A22; Brodsky, Marian
     Washington, D.C.'s Whitman-Walker AIDS Clinic does not serve
children with HIV, claims Marian Brodsky, of Children's National 
Medical Center in a letter to the editor of the Washington Post. 
Brodsky, who serves as hospital volunteer coordinator of Project 
CHAMP (Children's HIV/AIDS Model Program), takes issue with a 
recent Post article that called Whitman-Walker "the largest 
health care and legal provider" for area AIDS patients.  She 
points out that CHAMP provides medical care, volunteer services, 
respite care, and recreational activities to more than 70 percent 
of children with HIV and AIDS in the Washington, D.C. area, as 
well as providing community outreach.
     
"Study of Access to Medical Care Finds Outlook Remains Grim for 
Uninsured"
Wall Street Journal (10/23/96) P. B9; Winslow, Ron
     As many as 17 million adults have difficulty getting the
medical care they need or struggle to pay for it when care is 
obtained, a new study has found.  Researchers at Harvard 
University report in today's issue of the Journal of the American 
Medical Association that 15 percent of the U.S. population is 
uninsured.  Led by Karen Donelan of the Harvard School of Public 
Health, the researchers report that those lacking insurance were 
four times more likely than those with insurance to fail to get 
the care they needed and three times more likely to struggle to 
pay their medical bills.  Furthermore, they said, those in the 
poorest health had the most problems getting care.
     
"USA Snapshots: AIDS in the Workplace" 
USA Today (10/23/96) P. 1B
     Employees at about one in six companies are offered HIV/AIDS
education, according to the Centers for Disease Control and 
Prevention's Business Responds to AIDS Program.  Only about 6 
percent of companies with less than 50 employees offered employee 
AIDS education, compared to 32 percent of companies with at least 
750 workers.
     
"ADA's Miseries and Accommodations"
Washington Times (10/23/96) P. A15; Germer, Fawn
     Critics of the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) argue
that measures needed for compliance are too costly and 
time-consuming, but supporters say that the changes are fair and 
necessary.  The ADA prohibits employment and public access 
discrimination against disabled people--including those who use 
wheelchairs, the hearing impaired, blind, learning-disabled, 
recovering alcoholics, and those with HIV and other diseases. 
According to the ADA definition, about 49 million Americans are 
disabled--more than one in six.  The ADA, moreover, has sparked 
thousands of lawsuits, most of which were against businesses that 
must make "reasonable accommodations" to allow disabled people to 
work.  For example, a man in Indiana who lost his job because he 
was HIV-infected was awarded $25,000 in damages in a lawsuit 
against his employer because the employer did not keep his medical 
condition confidential.
     
"Survey: Congress Hopefuls Lean to Drug Prevention" 
USA Today (10/23/96) P. 3A; Johnson, Kevin
     Prevention is the favored tool among many Republican and 
Democratic congressional candidates for reducing teen drug use, 
in contrast to the enforcement methods favored by their parties' 
presidential candidates.  A new survey, conducted by the 
Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America, found that 65 percent 
of the 1,000 candidates that responded favored education programs 
over the punitive and interdiction proposals offered by President 
Clinton and GOP nominee Bob Dole.  The survey also found that 13 
percent of the respondents supported some type of drug 
legalization that included the legalization of marijuana for 
medical use.
     
"HIV Perinatal Transmission Risk Not Affected by Infection 
Outcome of Previous Siblings"
Reuters (10/22/96)
     The risk that a woman will transmit HIV to a child does not 
increase with time, according to researchers at Emory University. 
In the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Journal, Dr. Steven Nesheim 
and colleagues report on a study of 114 HIV-positive women who 
gave birth to at least two children after becoming infected. Among 
members of that group, 18 percent of the younger siblings and 17 
percent of the older children became infected.  The researchers 
concluded that strong maternal factors do not affect the risk of 
perinatal transmission, but rather that the risk is linked to 
factors associated with the individual pregnancy and delivery.
     
"New Surveillance Tool Introduced for Global Monitoring of HIV-1 
Variants"
Reuters (10/22/96)
     A new method has been developed to determine more easily the
type of HIV-1 that is in a contaminated blood sample.  Sharon 
Cassol of the University of Ottawa and other Canadian researchers 
report that their method, which involves collecting a blood 
sample on paper and mailing it to a laboratory for analysis, 
avoids the biohazards associated with processing and shipping 
whole blood or cell samples from developing countries.  The 
researchers analyzed dried blood spot samples from HIV-1 positive 
patients in five Asian countries, and found that, in southern 
India, type C was most prevalent, with rare occurrences of type 
A.  Their findings agreed with what has been reported in western 
and northern India.
     
"Here's the Straight Dope"
Newsweek (10/21/96) Vol. 128, No. 17, P. 37; Klaidman, Daniel
     While Bob Dole's charges about the rise in drug use during
the Clinton administration have received a lot of attention 
during the presidential campaign, his claims may be misleading, 
writes Daniel Klaidman in Newsweek.  The proportion of teens 
using marijuana rose from 4 percent in 1992 to 8.2 percent last 
year, according to the National Household Survey on Drug Abuse. 
The reported rise in the use of harder drugs, however, may be too 
small to be statistically significant, survey experts say.  In 
addition, the rise in marijuana use actually started in 1992, 
when President Bush was still in office.  Drug-policy experts 
point out that prevention programs take years to have an impact. 
Furthermore, overall drug use has remained the same or decreased 
since the Clinton administration began.  Clinton, meanwhile, has 
also used statistics from the Household survey, noting that 
cocaine use dropped from 2.6 percent to 1.7 percent last year.  
According to Klaidman, he has slightly exaggerated the decrease 
as 30 percent, when it is actually closer to 21 percent.  
Clinton's claims of increased drug control and border enforcement 
are also misleading, Klaidman concludes, because his 
administration cut interdiction funding by 50 percent in 1993, 
then raised it, but not to the original level.
     
"A Reluctant Campaigner"
Newsweek (10/21/96) Vol. 128, No. 17, P. 36; Kosova, Weston; 
Klaidman, Daniel
     Gen. Barry McCaffrey, President Clinton's drug czar since
last year, is more interested in long-term solutions to the drug 
problem than campaigning for Clinton's re-election.  He believes 
that drug use can be diminished more effectively through long-term 
prevention and treatment programs, rather than through 
incarceration and interdiction, which Clinton has favored.  
McCaffrey is valuable to Clinton, because he is respected by both 
Democrats and Republicans.  His testimony to Republicans on the 
welfare bill this summer persuaded them, for example, to drop a 
provision that would have stopped benefits to recipients who are 
arrested on drug-related charges.