fisher@smiley.DEC (Gerry --- Terminally Inane) (10/02/85)
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Here's documentation about health care workers pricking
themselves with needles and *not* contracting AIDS.
AND...
Here's documentation about none of the members in AIDS
households getting AIDS through casual contact!!!
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RE: School children with AIDS in Massachusetts.
"Emotions Run High at Meeting on AIDS: Boy's return to
class in Swansea defended"
9/12/85
Reprinted without permission from the Boston Globe.
Parents of junior high school students here held an emotion-charged
meeting last night with doctors and school officials who defended
their decision to allow an eighth-grader diagnosed with AIDS to attend
the local public school.
Nearly 700 parents packed the Joseph Case High School Auditorium, some
expressing pride in the decision, but many others accusing the
officials of endangering their children.
"We're not dealing with mumps or measles. We're dealing with a
deadly, incurable disease," said _____ _____, a parent.
"We've been through hell for about a week and a half," said _______
______, another parent. "It's like allowing a kid to run around with
a gallon of gas and a match."
Many in the room demanded and iron-clad guarantee that their children
would not contract AIDS, which kills its victims by attacking the
body's defense system.
__ ______ ______, Massachusetts state epidemiologist and associate
commissioner of education in charge of communicable diseases, said
that as long as the children did not have sex with the infected child,
the chances of contracting the disease were virtually zero.
"There is no mystery to AIDS transmission," _____ said. "It's not
through handshakes, not water coolers, not sneezing, not toilet seats,
but fluid to blood."
School Superintendent ____ _ ________ said the point of the meeting
was to assure the town that the boy, a hemophiliac who contracted AIDS
during treatment, posed no danger to his classmates.
After the three-hour session last night, school officials distributed
a fact sheet and a state school attendance policy on AIDS. The sheet
says that seven children have been reported with AIDS in
Massachusetts, three of whom have died. Of four remaining victims,
one is in a hospital and two are too young to attend school.
The AIDS attendance policy says unless a child has skin eruptions, or
exhibits inappropriate behavior such as biting or frequent
incontinence, he should attend school.
Some parents leaving the auditorium said they felt relieved.
"A lot of us has so much misinformation. The doctors alleviated most
of our fears," said _____ ____. But _____ _____ said, "As a parent,
I'll never feel completely assured."
School Principal ______ _ ______ said he thought the meeting went
well. "Most of the parents were very receptive," he said.
Swansea, a tidy community of clapboard homes and well-mowed lawns, has
been a center of national attention since it became known last week
that a 12-year-old boy at the school had AIDS.
Some of the 16,000 people who live here on the border of Massachusetts
and Rhode Island say they resent the attention.
________ said he wanted to prevent the kind of reaction that took
place in Queens, NY, where about 12,000 elementary and junior high
school pupils were kept out of school last Monday to boycott the
presence of a second grade student with AIDS.
Swansea parents wanted to know why they had not been informed of the
boy's condition before classes began two weeks ago at the Joseph Case
Junior High School.
________ said he had followed state regulations to the letter by
informing the principal, teachers and school nurse. The decision to
let the unidentified boy attend school was made by the state
Department of Education in consultation with the boy's physician, __
_____ _____.
Earlier, _____, director of the Rhode Island Hospital Hemophilia
Center in Providence, said the facts regarding transmission of AIDS
were now solid enough that "we can act responsibly upon them and in
this case, the right thing to do is to allow AIDS victims to partake
in the activities to which all of us are entitled."
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As proof of this, _____ said the National Institute of Health in
Bethesda, Maryland had studied 500 health workers who had treated AIDS
patients around the country. Of those, only three carried the AIDS
antibody and all three were in a high risk category, meaning they were
homosexuals or IV drug users.
Fifty of the 500 had injured themselves with needles used on AIDS
patients, and none of them contracted the disease.
"Casual transmission is practically impossible," _____ said. "In none
of the 12,000 households where AIDS has been diagnosed has another
family member contracted the disease from casual contact."
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_______ _______, a nurse whose 13-year-old daughter is a friend of the
hemophiliac boy, said she agreed with the decision to allow him to
attend school.
"If there was a kid with hepatitis or meningitis in the school, my kid
would be out," _______ said, "But in this situation, I feel confident
he should be in school."
AIDS was discovered in 1978. The disease has afflicted more that
12,000 Americans, about half of whom have died. It has primarily
affected homosexual men and IV drug abusers.
The child, whose identity is being protected by the school system, is
mature and highly knowledgeable about his condition, according to
______, principal of the 640-student junior high school.
_____, the boy's physician, said his patient was a very private person
and resents the media attention.
"He's been cheerful however, not self-pitying," _____ said.
[END OF ARTICLE]
Gerry Fisher
...decvax!decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-smiley!fisher
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Nashua, NH: Where the men are men, and the sheep are nervous.phil@amdcad.UUCP (Phil Ngai) (10/05/85)
I was talking to a girl about this and she was horrified at the idea
of letting kids with AIDS attend school. She says whenever she got
in a fight she would use anything she could, which included biting
the opponent. That sounds like a very good way to pass AIDS.
--
Arthur Rudolph believed that technology is morally neutral and so,
therefore, are those who create it.
Phil Ngai +1 408 749-5720
UUCP: {ucbvax,decwrl,ihnp4,allegra}!amdcad!phil
ARPA: amdcad!phil@decwrl.ARPA