AIDS: Package Response

The California Medical Assn. is supporting a package of four bills addressing different aspects of efforts to control AIDS. The package is incomplete in one conspicuous element, but offers a better response than most of the more than 100 bills awaiting action in Sacramento.

Missing from the legislative package is any plan to create a state AIDS commission. That is a basic recommendation of U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop. The utility of a commission has already been demonstrated both at the national level and at the regional level, as in the Los Angeles County AIDS Commission. It is the central proposal in AB 87, the omnibus AIDS measure now caught in the ugly politicking that has pitted the so-called Gang of Five and the Republican caucus against Speaker Willie Brown in the California Assembly. The medical association would substitute its bills for AB 87.

A particular strength of the California Medical Assn. package is its emphasis on the absolute importance of anti-discrimination legislation. This is embraced in AB 3795, introduced by Assemblyman John Vasconcellos (D-Santa Clara) to extend to those suffering from AIDS the same protections that other handicapped persons receive in guarding against discrimination in housing and employment. The medical association has recognized that these protections are crucial to its other proposals for relaxing existing restrictions on the sharing of AIDS test information.

SB 2851, sponsored by Sen. Gary K. Hart (D-Santa Barbara), would relax existing restrictions on the sharing of AIDS test results among health-care providers. Doctors would be permitted to test for the AIDS virus with an informed oral consent of the patient rather than the written consent that is now required, and would be permitted to share the results with other health-care providers as necessary to facilitate the diagnosis and treatment of the patient. That is an important way of assuring the protection of doctors and nurses in treating persons with the virus while still respecting basic confidentiality.

Under SB 2788, introduced by Sen. Ken Maddy (R-Fresno), the doctors would be granted extended authority to share positive test results with third parties at risk. Under legislation passed last year, doctors may inform spouses. Under the new legislation, that would be extended to sexual partners or those sharing intravenous drug needles. Doctors also would be permitted to report a positive drug test to public-health officers to facilitate their intervention to protect others.

Finally, the California Medical Assn. has voted to support Hart’s revived AIDS education bill, SB 2840. The bill in its original form was vetoed last year by Gov. George Deukmejian--a great mistake that has set back this crucial program by at least a year. The new bill would mandate AIDS education for every pupil in Grades 7 through 12, but would leave the curriculum to the local school district. That is better than nothing. Far better would have been a standard state-mandated program as originally proposed and supported by most public-health officials.

Constructive action by the California Legislature in the weeks ahead on AIDS legislation would help head off some of the extreme proposals--notably Proposition 69 on the June ballot, a revival of the LaRouche initiative that already has drawn the opposition of the California Medical Assn. and virtually all professionals who are engaged in the struggle to contain the disease.