AIDS-Related Bias Found on Rise Across U.S.

AIDS-related discrimination is on the rise across the nation, against not only those ill with the disease or infected with the Human Immunodeficiency Virus, but also their relatives and care-givers, according to the findings of an American Civil Liberties Union study released Saturday.

The ACLU took what is believed to have been the first comprehensive look at AIDS discrimination in the United States and found that complaints of AIDS-related bias nearly doubled in 1988, after an 88% increase 1987 from 1986.

In 1988, the report said, discrimination complaints came in 35% faster than new cases of AIDS were diagnosed, indicating that the prejudice spread more rapidly than the disease.

Of all reported incidents of bias, 30% involved individuals who suffered from discrimination “simply because of the perception that they were HIV-infected or because they cared for a person with HIV-disease,” the ACLU said.

A Connecticut family, for example, was denied housing because an adopted son had AIDS; an Illinois man was fired after his employer learned that “someone (he) knew was HIV-positive,” the report said. It also cited an incident in California in which an individual was “refused service after he informed his dentist that his brother had recently died of AIDS.”

Nan B. Hunter, outgoing director of the ACLU’s AIDS project and principal author of the report, said it shows “how extraordinarily persistent discrimination remains in this country, even after science has proven there is no risk of casual transmission.”

Thomas B. Stoddard, executive director of the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, a gay rights organization that litigates cases of AIDS-related discrimination, called the findings “absolutely chilling.”

“This report suggests that we are far less reasonable and compassionate than we would care to believe, even toward those struggling for their very lives,” he said.

Stoddard attributed the high level of discrimination partly to the knowledge that a majority of AIDS-afflicted people in this country are homosexual and bisexual men and users of intravenous drugs.

“If AIDS were evenly distributed throughout this society like cancer, every person in the United States would think of himself (as) at personal risk and would identify with people who are stricken,” Stoddard said. “That doesn’t happen with AIDS.”

Most instances of discrimination were related to employment, housing, public accommodations, insurance, delivery of government benefits such as Social Security and Medicaid and access to services such as dentistry and nursing home care.

The ACLU said that inconsistencies and gaps in anti-discrimination laws further contributed to the problem. State and local laws vary widely, and the two federal statutes that prohibit discrimination against disabled people are limited in their coverage.

“In the same town a schoolteacher who has AIDS could not be fired (because public schools are covered by federal law), but his mother, who works in a bank, could lose her job, even though she is only incorrectly perceived as being HIV-infected,” the report said. “In the same company, an employee with AIDS may be protected from being fired, but a customer with AIDS could be refused service.”

Dr. Mathilde Krim, founding co-chairwoman of the American Foundation for AIDS Research, sponsor of the study, called the work “extremely important” because “it is the first time the nature and extent of AIDS discrimination has been documented.”

She added: “People with AIDS or HIV infection face a daunting array of obstacles, and discrimination is certainly one of them.”

Larry Gostin, executive director of the American Society of Law and Medicine, called the report “a challenge to America to treat persons living with AIDS with human compassion and dignity, and to ensure their legal rights.”

The ACLU surveyed legal and advocacy agencies nationwide, and an estimated 40% of them returned a discrimination questionnaire. The agencies reported receiving an estimated 13,000 complaints of HIV-related discrimination between 1983 and 1988.

“The number of complaints and referrals represent what are probably the minimum figures,” the report said. “Had we asked even more agencies for their experiences, no doubt we would have received even more reports of discrimination.”

The report said that 91% of those filing complaints were gay or bisexual men, indicating that intravenous drug users, who are often poor and members of minority groups, are either unaware of their rights under the legal system or do not have enough money to take action.

Members of the gay community, on the other hand, typically are educated and affluent, and they have an already developed political network that makes it easier to pursue complaints, the report said.

Among other actions, the ACLU recommended intensifying efforts to educate people in the health care field “about their legal and ethical duty to provide care,” expanding legal services and increasing federal spending on the training of lawyers as experts in HIV-related issues.

The ACLU also called for stepped-up enforcement of anti-discrimination laws and tighter regulation of insurance practices to “create a system in which all Americans are assured access to health care.”

Discrimination and Aids Discimination reports: 1986: 905 ‘87: 1,698 ‘88: 2,548 New AIDS cases: 1986: 17,777 ‘87: 25,987 ‘88: 29,761 Types of discrimination Employment: 37% Housing: 16.4 Public Accommodation: 15.6 Insurance: 13.3 Government Services: 9.9 Health Care Services: 5 Violence: 2.9 Source: American Civil Liberties Union