Anti-AIDS Bias Plan Survives Opposition

Opponents of a proposed anti-AIDS discrimination ordinance for Los Angeles County showed up in force Tuesday intent on forcing the Board of Supervisors to overturn its support for a law that they claim would compel health-care workers and others to run the risk of contracting AIDS.

It was the largest public protest so far to the anti-discrimination law, but there was no indication that the public lobbying had changed any minds.

Supervisors tentatively approved the sweeping ordinance in a 3-2 vote more than two weeks ago. It would bar employers, landlords, schools and businesses in the county’s unincorporated areas from discriminating against those who have or are suspected of having acquired immune deficiency syndrome.

The law, which is to be be up for final vote next Tuesday, would make it illegal to exclude AIDS victims, people infected with the AIDS virus or those an employer suspects of carrying the virus from jobs and promotions.

The ordinance is milder than similar laws, in Los Angeles for example, that call for special enforcement by the city attorney’s office. The county law would leave it up to individuals to initiate complaints through the courts.

‘Forcing People’

Opponents of the ordinance contend that the county proposal is untenable and protects AIDS victims at the expense of health-care professionals, restaurant workers and others who fear that even nonsexual contact with an infected person can spread AIDS. Under the proposed county law, people with such fears could not legally refuse to treat or serve people with AIDS or who are suspected of having AIDS.

“We have to stop the AIDS epidemic, but not by forcing people to become exposed (to the virus),” said Leslie C. Dutton, president of the American Assn. of Women, an archconservative organization.

LaVonne Wilenken, a registered nurse and president of the California Nurses for Ethical Standards, told supervisors that her experience in hospital maternity wards shows that even such precautions as using protective gloves are inadequate in safeguarding health-care workers from infected blood or other fluids.

“I have little children at home, and I love my job,” said Wilenken, “but I’m here to tell you that we’re not protected, and . . . what’s going to happen is I’m going to have to quit doing what it is that I love.”

The AIDS virus is spread primarily through exchanges of semen and blood, usually through sexual contact or contaminated hypodermic needles.

U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, the American Medical Assn. and other professionals have said that doctors and nurses have a professional responsibility to provide care for people with AIDS and that the risk of infection is minimal if proper precautions are observed. A small number of health-care workers have contracted the virus through accidental punctures from needles contaminated with infected blood.

Members of the county Commission on AIDS, which pushed for the ordinance, have said the law is needed to quickly resolve discrimination complaints and to ensure that those afflicted with AIDS do not hide their infection because of fears that they will be victims of bias.

Dave Johnson, who chairs the United AIDS Coalition, an umbrella group for organizations that help AIDS sufferers, backed the proposed law and said Tuesday that it would send a strong message that “all human life is valuable and worthy of dignity.”

In postponing a final vote until next week, board chairman Ed Edelman sought to ensure that the three supervisors who originally backed the ordinance would be present.

Supervisor Deane Dana, a conservative, had joined his liberal colleagues, Edelman and Supervisor Kenneth Hahn, in approving the ordinance.

Dana was out of town Tuesday, so opponents of the proposed law, which included a number of black constituents from Hahn’s South-Central Los Angeles district, zeroed in on him in hopes of persuading him to reconsider his vote.

Hahn remained silent in the face of their pleadings, however, and later his chief deputy, Mas Fukai, said his boss has no intention of switching his vote.