Ban on Foreigners With AIDS Virus May Be Ended

The government has moved to drop a controversial ban on travel and immigration to the United States by people from other countries who are infected with the deadly AIDS virus, officials said Friday.

The Department of Health and Human Services on Wednesday published a proposal to list infectious tuberculosis as the only communicable disease that would bar foreign visitors, workers, refugees and immigrants from the United States.

The proposal, which would take effect June 1, would eliminate leprosy and six sexually transmitted infections--including infection with the AIDS virus--from the list, officials said.

People infected with the AIDS virus had been restricted since 1987, sparking strong protests. Health and Human Services Secretary Louis Sullivan was met with loud, noisy demonstrators who pelted him with condoms when he spoke at an international AIDS conference in San Francisco last year.

“AIDS evokes an emotional response from many--and that’s understandable--but we have been virtually the only major country to try to bar HIV-infected travelers. This policy will bring us in line with the best medical thinking, here and abroad,” Sullivan said in a statement issued Friday.

HIV stands for human immunodeficiency virus, which causes AIDS.

The decision was praised by AIDS activists.

“I think it is wonderful . . . (but) I can’t believe what we had to go through to make this finally happen,” said Stephen Bennett, chief executive officer of AIDS Project Los Angeles.

“We spent time on this when we should have been working on getting this disease cured,” he said.

The proposal, however, has been opposed by some members of Congress.

Rep. Marge Roukema (R-N.J.) asked President Bush to overrule Sullivan’s decision, calling it “ill-advised.”

“Existing immigration regulations are designed to protect the health of U.S. citizens,” Roukema said.

“Removing AIDS from the list of proscribed illnesses undermines the intent of these regulations with no medical reason.”