TV Reviews : Mixed Message From ‘Health Quarterly’

The short-lived “AIDS Quarterly,” produced through PBS’ Boston affiliate, WGBH, seemed to be the least that public television could do to cover one of the world’s most expensive--and perhaps most politically volatile--health crisis. Now, “The AIDS Quarterly” has become “The Health Quarterly” (the first episode airs at 8 tonight on Channels 28 and 15), and the change is sending out a decidedly mixed message.

A segment about AIDS--specifically, on people defying the experts and living with the disease--is included in the program’s magazine-style format. But that segment is dwarfed by extensive pieces on heath insurance shortages and legislative blockades to genuine health care reform.

Yet we are reminded by host Peter Jennings that, 10 years after the first AIDS case was documented in the United States, there is still no vaccine and only one, very expensive treatment. Atlanta AIDS activist Sandy Thurman frets over the disappointingly low amounts of citizen and government support while the disease is spreading.

Let’s see if we have this right: AIDS is worse than ever, so PBS cuts back its coverage.

The rest of this “Quarterly” edition suggests a country breaking down. We see the halls of Congress so clogged with lobbyists from conflicting interest groups that a reasonable health reform package can’t find enough votes. More disturbing still are working people like Bill Reed, whose young daughter’s debilitating diseases couldn’t be covered by his employer’s health plan, and Devi Peterson, who, like more than 30 million other Americans, can’t afford health insurance. This, while she works at two jobs--one of which is answering phones for a health care hot line.