Subject: Federal Panel Urges Action To Fight AIDS 
Date: Published: 9/26/91 (75 lines)
Source:  Wall Street Journal.  Copyright Dow Jones & Co. Inc. 

    Technology & Health:
    Federal Panel
    Urges Action
    To Fight AIDS
    ----
    By Hilary Stout
    Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

    WASHINGTON -- The National Commission on AIDS issued 30
 recommendations for fighting the deadly epidemic, from
 expanding Medicaid to cover all low-income AIDS patients to
 providing drug abuse treatment to all who need it.
    Many of the panel's suggestions, however, are expensive
 and unlikely to be readily embraced by the budget-strapped
 federal and state governments.  But the commission chairman,
 June Osborn, warned that to not follow the recommendations
 would be more costly in the long term.
    The commission, whose members were appointed two years ago
 by President Bush and Congress, called on the president to
 develop a national AIDS plan that spells out priorities and
 identifies the resources needed to treat and prevent the
 disease.  It urged President Bush to "use the bully pulpit" to
 call attention to the disease and educate the country.
    "Our nation's leaders have not done well," the commission
 said in its report, "America Living With AIDS.  "
    "In the past decade, the White House has rarely broken its
 silence on the topic of AIDS.  Congress has shown leadership
 in developing critical legislation, but has often failed to
 provide adequate funding for AIDS programs," the report said.
    The commission charged that prejudice, ignorance and lack
 of leadership has crippled the country's ability to confront
 the disease, which has killed more than 100,000 Americans in
 the past decade.
    In a letter to the president, the commission said that "we
 must either engage seriously the issues and needs posed by
 this deadly disease or face relentless expanding tragedy in
 the decades ahead."
    White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater asserted that the
 government has been "aggressive in responding to the AIDS
 crisis."  He added that the administration would consider the
 report and "try to improve the system as best we can."
    Acquired immune deficiency syndrome was identified only 10
 years ago.  Since then, it has claimed the lives of 120,000
 Americans, a death toll that the federal government projects
 will double to more than 350,000 by 1993.
    The Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta estimates that
 one in every 100 adult males in the U. S. carries the AIDS
 virus.  Moreover, the CDC predicts that by year end, AIDS may
 be one of the top five causes of death among women.
    In its report, the commission called for universal health
 coverage for all Americans.  But in the interim, it
 recommended that Medicaid, the joint federal-state health
 program for the poor, be expanded to cover all low-income
 people with AIDS or the AIDS virus.  The report estimated that
 it would cost the states and the federal government $354
 million more this fiscal year to cover those at or below the
 poverty line.  Nearly 30% of AIDS patients today have no
 health insurance.  The average cost of treating an AIDS
 patient last year was $32,000, according to the report.
    It urged full funding of legislation -- named after Ryan
 White, a teenager who died of the disease -- that provides
 federal money to communities where AIDS is particularly
 acute.  To date, Congress has appropriated only one-third of
 the funds it authorized in the bill.
    The commission also said minorities and low-income people
 should be better represented in clinical trials of new AIDS
 drugs.

[This article is made available here by Dow Jones Co. for the
 personal and non-commercial use of callers to this bbs, in the
 hope that it will be of some help to those who are suffering
 from the disease and others who are seeking to help them.]