County Gets U.S. AIDS Grant

Orange County will receive an $887,700 federal grant over the next three years to set up hospice care and plan new services for AIDS patients, county AIDS coordinator Penny C. Weismuller announced Wednesday.

The grant is considered important because the county now has no hospice for patients with the disease.

Because of a severe shortage of beds, as well as concerns over the communicability of acquired immune deficiency syndrome, no skilled nursing facility, intermediate care or convalescent care facility in Orange County will admit AIDS patients, Weismuller said.

(However, some county skilled nursing facilities care for a few AIDS patients who developed the disease at the nursing home after blood transfusions, she said.)

The grant will give Orange County $200,000 in the 1987-88 fiscal year, with $83,000 set aside this year to establish a residential facility for six Orange County AIDS patients. The grant also provides seed money to start continuing programs, including:

- Education for health professionals, especially doctors, about the diagnosis and treatment of AIDS, to expand the pool of people who know how to treat AIDS.

- Education for minorities about the transmission of AIDS. This would include outreach to youth gangs, park and recreation classes and English-as-a-second-language classes.

- A “case manager” or counselor for each group of 50 patients who have AIDS or an AIDS-related illness, to assure that each AIDS patient receives appropriate services.

- A new registry for attendants who will be trained to care for AIDS patients at home.

With the grant, “we’re going to make sure people (with AIDS) don’t fall through the cracks,” declared committee member Werner Kuhn, executive director of the Gay and Lesbian Community Center of Orange County in Garden Grove.

News of the grant came Wednesday afternoon as the county committee that advises the Board of Supervisors on AIDS received the latest numbers of AIDS-related deaths.

The figures, from Sept. 11, showed that the number of AIDS cases in Orange County rose slightly from last month, with 517 AIDS cases reported since 1980, of whom 312 have died. They showed two new AIDS cases and seven additional deaths since Weismuller released statistics on Aug. 26.

“There were not a lot of surprises” in the new statistics, said Dr. L. Rex Ehling, county public health director, adding that homosexuals continue to account for about 70% of the county’s caseload.

As the numbers continue to rise, the county has about as many cases as Chicago, he added.

Also Wednesday, the committee voted to expand its nearly all-Caucasian membership to include representatives from Asian, black and Hispanic communities. Just one minority member now sits on the committee, on the education subcommittee.

The committee also accepted a report that sets priorities this year for AIDS education in the county. A first priority was reaching and educating “men who have sex with men,” the report said.

After that, the county must educate “health care providers, employers and employees, teachers in schools, minors, and intravenous drug users and prostitutes,” in that order of priority, the report said. It also suggested that all county businesses and Chambers of Commerce provide AIDS education.

A manual is being distributed to help deal with AIDS in the workplace. Part IV, Page 1.