NATION : Ryan White, Whose AIDS Story Moved the World, Is Near Death

Ryan White, the young AIDS patient whose rejection by hometown classmates brought him sympathy and support from all over the world, was in critical condition this afternoon at Riley Hospital for Children and was not expected to survive internal bleeding that has left him unconscious.

Carrie Van Dyke, director of health promotion for the State Board of Health, said she had spoken to White’s mother, Jeanne, at lunchtime and was told that the 18-year-old Cicero youth was not expected to survive the day.

“He’s not responding,” she told the Associated Press in a telephone interview. “I don’t think it’s the AIDS as much as he’s a hemophiliac, and he’s bleeding internally, and that’s the problem,” Van Dyke said.

White, whose story was told in a 1989 television movie, was admitted to Riley Hospital on Thursday.

White was barred from Western Middle School near Kokomo in 1985 because he had contracted acquired immune deficiency syndrome through a blood-clotting agent used to treat hemophilia. After months of school board battles and court hearings, he won the right to attend school.