SECBH%CUNYVM.BITNET@mitvma.mit.edu (06/27/91)
I have just finished reading the cover story in the July 1, 1991 issue of Newsweek, "Doctors and AIDS". My immediate reaction is that despite presenting both pros and cons on testing of medical personnel and disclosure of test results, the most likely result will to be terrify the public and inflame popular opinion to the point where rational discussion of the issue will not be possible. Perhaps the most "dramatic" part of the article is the story of Dr. Philip Benson. Dr. Benson is described in the article by one patient as having "oozing sores" on his hands and arms when he examined her newly born infant, and examining the child's mouth and vagina while ungloved. A TV station has a film which purports to show Dr. Benson delivering a baby while gloved, but with "sores' on his bare arms. Considerable attention is given to describing the condition of Kimberly Bergalis in the terminal condition of AIDS. It is my feeling that the material presented on Dr. Benson and Ms. Bergalis is likely to freak most readers right out of their wits if they do not have some first-hand knowledge of AIDS. I found myself struggling to control anger against Ms. Bergalis as I read her comments about her condition in the article. In another newsgroup I refrained from entering a discussion concerning her letter to Florida health officials which was released to the press by her parents because I felt that its contents were not extreme. I feel quite different about her comments (other than the letter) as quoted in article. And, I feel that Newsweek which opens this article with her story and quotes from her shows a decided lack of overall perspective. Having seen dozens and dozens and dozens of men and women die of AIDS, some of them as young or younger than Ms. Bergalis (she is 23), I can say that there is nothing especially gruesome or more poignant about her condition and her fate than there is about the fate of those many others who have sickened and died with AIDS. Yet I got the impression that Ms. Bergalis and Newsweek thinks there is. Chop my fingers off, but here goes: There is nothing special about Kimberly Bergalis, and if she doesn't know it and Newsweek doesn't know it -- who's fault is that? It's the Ryan White Cry-athon for for the Great Straight White World to get all teary and self-righteous over. I could show Ms. Bergalis and Newsweek two 23 year olds about twenty blocks from here who are in the same condition as she is. They didn't ask to have AIDS any more than she did. The difference is that they don't think what is happening to them is special. Somehow they have made a connection in their 23 years which this woman has not, they know that they are dying of AIDS and not of a disease called Innocent Victim. Ms. Bergalis seems to be suffering as much from the latter. She has had a chance to find out what death by AIDS is in the 23 years she has been alive; Newsweek and the rest of the media has had the opportunity deflate the myth of Innocent Victim. As far as I am concerned both parties must take a great deal of the responsibility for the bitterness surrounding her dying, and for the mischief that it will let loose among us. Jack Carroll
rkelly%triton.unm.edu@ariel.unm.edu (Robert Kelly) (06/28/91)
Jack Carroll writes: >Chop my fingers off, but here goes: There is nothing special about >Kimberly Bergalis, and if she doesn't know it and Newsweek doesn't >know it -- who's fault is that? It's the Ryan White Cry-athon for >for the Great Straight White World to get all teary and self-righteous >over. *Whack!* (Darn, missed...) I agree with you. What this tells me, though, is that the Great White Male (and Publically Straight) are going to become more open to supporting AIDS legislation, because they are able to ride to a white princess' rescue. It's sad that it takes a white woman's death to help out the AIDS medical feild, because they don't care about black women, IV drug user's, and etc, etc, etc... Makes one wonder what would happen if Helms got it... Robert Kelly rkelly@triton.unm.edu -------------------------------------------------------------------- "I'm afraid I'm not personally qualified to confuse cats." Monty Python