News & Notes

Prisoners' Rights Appeal Opposed
Oral Sex Transmission Reported
Colombian AIDS Activist Dies
New Leadership At IAPAC

Prisoners' Rights Appeal Opposed

In a move opposed by prisoners' rights and HIV/AIDS advocates alike, the Clinton administration has urged the Supreme Court not to hear an appeal in Davis v. Hopper, a discrimination case brought by HIV-positive prisoners against the Alabama prison system.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit ruled last year that Alabama's categorical exclusion of HIV-infected inmates from more than seventy programs available to other prisoners did not violate the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. The appeals court based its ruling on the seriousness of AIDS and the prospect of prisoners transmitting the virus to one another, stating, "When the adverse event is the contraction of fatal disease, the risk of transmission can be significant even if the probability of transmission is low."

The administration's position was set forth in a brief filed in response to a request by the Supreme Court for the government's views. Conceding that the ruling "may be overbroad," and that "the court should have carefully examined the circumstances and effect" of allowing participation, Solicitor General Seth P. Waxman nevertheless argued that the appeals court's opinion was correct in deferring to Alabama prison officials the assessment of risk presented by "the violence that is an inescapable part of prison life." The brief went on to say that the likelihood of high-risk behavior occurring if HIV-positive and HIV-negative prisoners were integrated "turns not on medical judgments about the risk inherent in certain behaviors, but on prison management judgments about the ability of prison authorities to control prisoners in various settings and programs."

Alabama's segregation policy precludes HIV-positive inmates from participating in such activities as religious services, data-processing classes, and testing for high school equivalency diplomas, as well as in a work-release program that could shorten their stay behind bars. Inmates argue that decisions should be based on individual assessments of inmates and programs, as is done in the federal prison system and those of most states. Only in Alabama, Mississippi, and South Carolina are prisoners with HIV automatically segregated.

Oral Sex Transmission Reported

In the most definitive study to date, researchers have found evidence that a significant percentage of new HIV infections in some groups of men who have sex with men are due to oral sex, a mode of transmission some have regarded as posing little or no risk. At the Seventh Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections in January, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that 7.8 percent of a group of HIV-infected men had been infected through oral sex.

In a press release, the CDC stated: "Public health officials fear that many gay men may be increasing the frequency of oral sex as a replacement for higher-risk behaviors, but may assume that oral sex is a risk-free activity. While oral sex may carry a much lower risk of transmitting HIV than other forms of sex, this study suggests that repeated exposures may add up to pose a more significant risk.

The study, conducted under the direction of the CDC's Dr. Beth Dillon, utilized a new testing technology recently developed by the CDC, Serologic Testing Algorithm for Recent HIV Seroconversions, which the researchers say can help pinpoint recent infections, thus identifying risk behaviors that may have occurred.

"For some, oral sex is equated with safe sex. However, for the individuals in this study, and for countless others, this false assumption has led to tragic lifelong consequences," according to Helene D. Gayle, M.D., M.P.H., Director of the CDC's National Center for HIV, STD, and TB Prevention.

Colombian AIDS Activist Dies

Dr. Henry Ardila, founder and former Executive Director of the Liga Colombiana de Lucha Contra el SIDA (Colombian League in the Fight Against AIDS) died of heart failure in mid-January. Although Dr. Ardila had been ill in the past few months, his health had apparently improved and he had returned to work. He had been working with Jeffrey Stanton of the Lambda Project of the Liga and other AIDS activists to organize representation from Colombia at a series of strategic planning meetings on HIV/AIDS in Latin America sponsored by UNAIDS.

In an historical move on the part of the Colombian government to rely on HIV/AIDS activists for assistance in structuring a response to HIV/AIDS, Dr. Ardila had recently been named to lead a team of advisors on HIV/AIDS to the Colombian Health Ministry. Although he had spent many years as an activist and advocate on behalf of people with HIV and homosexuals in Latin America, it was only when he accepted the advisory post that Dr. Ardila publicly acknowledged that he was himself living with HIV. In a tribute, Andres Duque, Co-chair of the Colombian Lesbian and Gay Association, said, "His regional, national, and international work leaves an incredible legacy, not only to his name but to all those people with HIV/AIDS that benefited from his great work."

New Leadership At IAPAC

Gordon Nary, founder of the International Association of Physicians in AIDS Care, retired as the organization's Executive Director in January 2000. An outspoken commentator on clinical, social, economic, and ethical issues, Nary was an early critic of unscrupulous viatical firms, whom he accused of "trading in pork-belly futures." He is succeeded by José M. Zuniga, former Director of Communications at AIDS Action Council/Foundation.

Back to the March 2000 Issue of Body Positive Magazine.