County Needs AIDS Anti-Bias Measure : * Supervisors Can Right the Wrong of Not Approving Same Ordinance 2 1/2 Years Ago

There seems to have been a decided shift in the past 2 1/2 years in the public attitude toward AIDS sufferers and those diagnosed as being infected with HIV. Many people are more enlightened about the dread disease, its sufferers, and the public health issues involved.

The important question now is whether the Orange County Board of Supervisors has become more knowledgeable, compassionate and caring than it was 2 1/2 years ago. That is when a divided board rejected an ordinance to prohibit discrimination against people with AIDS in employment, housing and county services.

That inaction left Orange County the only urban county in the state that did not have such an anti-discrimination measure. What the county does have is about 2,000 AIDS cases and, health officials fear, many thousands more people who are HIV-positive--but don’t know it. And, despite a growing understanding about how acquired immune deficiency syndrome affects the entire community, the county still has too much senseless discrimination.

When the Orange County Community HIV Coalition recently asked the supervisors to reconsider their June, 1989, rejection and proposed a new anti-discrimination ordinance, the same knee-jerk, but illogical, opposition was heard.

The Rev. Louis P. Sheldon vowed to be just as active opposing the new effort as he was in 1989, declaring that “this is a homosexual issue very clearly.”

No it isn’t. Just ask Magic Johnson and thousands of other heterosexual patients like him. Ask the doctors, government officials and religious leaders supporting the proposed measure. It is a public health issue. A human rights issue. A fairness issue.

We hope all the county supervisors realize that now. In 1989 only Supervisors Thomas F. Riley and Harriett M. Wieder did. Wieder says the need for the anti-discrimination ordinance is “more urgent than ever” and hopes that this time the other supervisors will support it. We hope so too. Its passage can help encourage people to seek diagnosis, reduce the risk of spreading AIDS--and set an example for the rest of the community.

People who fear they may have AIDS shouldn’t avoid diagnosis and care because they fear even more the reaction that the diagnosis will bring to them. And people who are suffering the disease and its death sentence shouldn’t also have to suffer the senseless discrimination that leads to their being fired, evicted or denied jobs, homes or services because of illness.