AIDS Education Night Draws Only 25 People : Health: Two mothers who lost their sons to the disease are spearheading an effort to inform Newport-Mesa students and parents.

Perhaps, said Jean Johnson-Vogel and Joan Shaw, if they had been educated about AIDS years ago, their sons might still be alive.

As it was, 30-year-old Craig Johnson died in 1988, when his immune system could not overcome Kaposi’s sarcoma. Steven Shaw died a year later at age 37, when he had no white blood cells left to fight disease.

Determined that students in the Newport-Mesa Unified School District do not suffer the same end, the mothers are spearheading an effort to provide AIDS education for parents and students of the district, whose sex education program has been hit by controversy in recent years.

Johnson-Vogel and her husband, Paul Vogel, invited more than 100 people to their Corona del Mar house Wednesday night for some AIDS education, including groups that have opposed sex education in schools.

But only 25 people showed up, most of whom are representatives of AIDS hospices, nurses and HIV-positive patients. Parents and students were noticeably absent.

“They’re sending their children the message that they’re not concerned” about AIDS, Johnson-Vogel said. “How do they expect the schools to do something about their kids when they’re not there to show that they care?”

Joan Shaw, 52, of Garden Grove said she was still “hoping that we all can work together. I’ve already lost a son to AIDS; maybe if we all work together, other people’s children can be spared.”

However, David Cammack with AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power of Orange County, said the absence of parents from the meeting was indicative of the public’s nonchalance.

“People just don’t care,” he said. “They don’t think it will affect them.”

Still, Johnson-Vogel said she also hopes that those at the meeting could work together to fashion an AIDS education plan to present to the school board.

Some board members said they are open to suggestions that come out of the meeting and will do their best to weave them into the existing AIDS education policy, which currently focuses on abstinence and failure rates of condoms.

Said board member Rod MacMillian: “I think that all youngsters are susceptible to the possibility--if they participate in sex at all--of being exposed to AIDS or the HIV virus” that could lead to AIDS.

Therefore, MacMillian said, “I would hope that we would continue to explore all venues of bringing AIDS information to our youngsters so that it makes a lasting impression.”