State Cuts Laguna Clinic’s AIDS-Testing Funds

Due to state cutbacks because of the recession, $1,600 has been chopped from AIDS-testing funds originally pledged to the Laguna Beach Community Clinic.

The private, nonprofit clinic is the only one in South Orange County that offers testing for HIV, the virus that causes acquired immune deficiency syndrome. But clinic executive director Gary Erb said Tuesday that testing for the human immunodeficiency virus still will be offered, “even though we’ve already spent all the money budgeted for it.”

Erb said the state had originally allocated $35,000 for the clinic but now has reduced the amount to $33,400. He said the clinic will seek private donations to try to cover the shortfall.

“We certainly intend to continue to offer HIV testing,” he said. “It’s very important that we continue offering tests because we’re the only clinic to do this in South Orange County.”

A state health official in Sacramento said Tuesday that the Orange County Health Care Agency’s HIV-testing facility in Santa Ana so far has not been targeted in the state budget cutbacks.

“The state has said it will protect HIV test sites like the one Orange County operates (in Santa Ana),” said Cassie Perry, assistant secretary for public affairs of the state’s Health and Welfare Agency in Sacramento. But Perry acknowledged that some private clinics in the state, such as the one in Laguna Beach, are being hit by cutbacks in HIV testing.

Medical workers can determine if a person has been infected with the virus by testing a sample of blood. Knowledge of infection is important in extending the lives of those with the virus.

Requests for HIV tests spiraled in Orange County and elsewhere in the nation after basketball star Earvin (Magic) Johnson announced last month that he is infected with the virus.

Erb said Tuesday that requests for HIV tests had soared in South County following Johnson’s announcement.

“This cutback is particularly unfortunate because of the timing, hitting us now that the demand for testing is so high,” Erb said. “This is a very dangerous time to be cutting back on HIV funds.”

Tom Uram, director of Orange County’s Health Care Agency, said Tuesday that he deplores the cutback.

“AIDS is the disease of the century, and this is no time to be cutting funding for the disease,” Uram said.

But Perry said the state is doing its best to shield AIDS-related money from the budget cuts. Perry said a 1990 state law automatically triggers 4% budget cuts when state income starts falling below predicted levels. She said that law went into effect earlier this year because of falling income due to the recession. The result was hundreds of cuts in state programs, including many health programs.

Uram said he was not aware of the state budget cutbacks triggered by the 1990 law.

“I haven’t heard of any cutbacks for Orange County so far, and I hope I don’t hear of any,” he said. State officials in Sacramento said they had no county-by-county totals of how the cutbacks are affecting county health departments.

In Laguna Beach, the state’s cut has already been made, Erb noted.

“We’ll continue asking people who can pay to make a donation when they are tested,” Erb said. “It costs us $42 to make a test. Some people can afford to make a donation and are generous. Others can’t afford to pay anything, and we’ll continue to test them at no charge.”