MonitoRadio Conversations; #110; AIDS - Part One [1985-11-29]

Good evening, this is Lisa Taylor, producer of Conversations with the Christian Science Monitor. Tonight is show number 110 for November 29, 1985. The segment times for the show are as follows, number 1, 103, number 2, 6, 11, number 3, 7, 34, number 4, 6, 24, and number 5, 48 seconds. The promo tonight to be used on Monday to promote Monday night show is 30 seconds long. Now the following times are based on a running show time and they denote when each commercial break starts. We are also assuming that each commercial break is two minutes long. Commercial break number 1 starts at 103, number 2 starts at 9, 14, number 3 starts at 18, 48, and number 4 starts at 27, 12. The promos will follow the show feed by about 10 seconds as usual. Please pull off your appropriate promo. The show will start in about one minute and have a real good weekend. This is Conversations with the Christian Science Monitor, your host, Bob

McDonnell. Good evening. The United States is facing a national dilemma of how to come to grips with the AIDS issue. Sarah Terry, radio reporter for the Christian Science Monitor, recently completed a report on the many groups and individuals across the US who are finding constructive and understanding ways to help. Sarah talked with a wide variety of people including researchers, counselors, volunteers, doctors, and theologians. Tonight we're going to be touching on three of these areas. Sarah has joined us to talk with the principal of the junior high school which was the first public school in the US to re -admit a student diagnosed as having AIDS, a social worker at gay men's health crisis in New York City, and a psychiatrist at the University of California, Ed Los Angeles, who's worked with over 120 AIDS patients. Please stay with us. Sarah Terry and I will be back right after this.

This is Conversations with the Christian Science Monitor. I'd like to welcome Sarah Terry, radio reporter for the monitor who's joined me in the studio, Sarah. Thanks, Bob, very much. Our first guest that we'll be talking to is Harold Devine, principal of case junior high school in Swansea, Massachusetts. Harold, welcome to the program. Thank you, Bob. Harold, your school was the first school in the US to allow a child diagnosed as having AIDS to return to the classroom. How tough a decision was that? Once all of the facts had been assembled, it really wasn't a difficult decision at all. And when you're talking about the assembling of the facts, how did that all occur? We requested guidelines from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health from the Massachusetts State Department of Education and from the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta. And they were very forthcoming in sending us written documentation which would enable us to support the decision that was being made. Harold, when you first found out that you were going to be having a child diagnosed with AIDS attending your school, what were your first

concerns? What were you thinking about? My first concerns were, I think, normal concerns. I was concerned for the health and welfare of the 643 other students and the 50 or so faculty members that would be attending this school every day. As the information became available and the educational process took hold on me, it became apparent that that wasn't the concern, but rather the rights of the victim then became paramount because it became obvious that he would certainly pose no danger within the school setting to any of the groups that I mentioned. Harold, now you made the decision to allow the boy to return to the classroom. That was the first hurdle. You're dealing there as well with parents who had a lot of concerns and as parents all over the United States do, how did you deal with them? Well, when school opened, it really was in a public issue. We had a bit of a catch 22 dilemma facing us. We knew that we would have to inform

the parents. We knew that they certainly had a stake in becoming aware of what was going on, but at the same time, we were bound by the laws of confidentiality to protect the identity and the confidentiality of the victim. And until the issue did become public some two weeks into the school year, we were kind of in a state of limbo, but there was never any doubt, now mine, that it would become a public issue and at that time, it would have to be dealt with. How did you prepare to deal with that? Well, we began by doing as complete an educational job as we could with the faculty. We felt it was paramount that the faculty understand that there was nothing for them to fear. And the best way to do that was to make them as knowledgeable as possible. It was then a matter of time before we would address the issue with the parents. Harold, when I visited Case Junior High a few weeks back, I spoke with some of the students there who know this young fellow. They were very supportive. They spoke in quite supportive terms about his needs and his rights. Were the students always that way?

When the issue became public, we had the students in school. And I think that was a very fortuitous kind of circumstance. We were able to address the real issues before the students left the environment of the school and before they were subjected to newspaper reporters and TV camera men and also with some of the fears of their parents. In many instances, we found that the students became the teacher to the parent. So you educated the children about the disease? That's correct. And then they in turn were able to talk with their parents at home and perhaps their family physicians as well. Well, as parents called me, once it became a public issue, my response to the parents was to contact your pediatrician, your health care expert, your family physician, the medical expert that they trusted and to ask the medical questions to them. Don't ask the medical questions to me. And I also told them, I don't want you to trust me. I want you to find out the facts

and be reassured. Don't put your trust in me. And they did. And the medical community in and around Swansea acted in a very responsible manner in attempting to reconcile the fears that these people were expressing. How would you characterize or comment on the response then of the community there in Swansea to the situation in case junior high? In one word, compassionate. And Harold, why? Swansea's a small community, about 15 ,000. Why do you think this community was able to not react out of hysteria or fear? Well, I think the informational process was of a very high quality and people were willing to accept what was being said. They certainly showed a tremendous amount of compassion toward one of their own. And every parent in this school could put themselves in the place of the parents of this victim. What has the community done anything special to help the student? They've done a lot of special things. There has been a group

formed called Friends of Mark. And Friends of Mark have run a fundraising dance. They have sponsored a fundraising raffle. And also members from Friends of Mark have, on a personal level, prepared meals on a daily basis. A different member of the organization each day will bring the dinner meal to the home of the victim just so that the parents will have an opportunity to relax a little bit because they lead quite a hectic existence. And the kind of of outpouring from the community has been something remarkable to say. Harold, thank you very much for being with us tonight on conversations. My pleasure. Thanks, Harold. You're welcome. We've been speaking with Harold Divine, the Principal of Case Junior High School in Swansea, Massachusetts. Sarah and I will be back right after this message with our next guest, Sandy Fineblum. Welcome back to conversations with the Christian Science Monitor. Sarah Terry, radio

reporter for the Monitor, is with me. And we're going to continue our discussion about the response to the AIDS crisis. Our next guest is Sandy Fineblum, Assistant Director of Clinical Services at Gay Men's Health Crisis in New York City. Sandy, welcome to the program. Thank you. Sarah, you want to start off here? Sandy, especially since Rock Hudson's very public and tragic death, the media has picked up a lot more coverage of AIDS stories. Quite often though, they seem to be the stories of despair or the horror stories or even sometimes some of the hysteria. Is that the response you're finding at Gay Men's Health Crisis? I think that generally we see a much more positive reaction. You know, we see people coming forward and offering to help more than we see people calling or coming in to be disparaging in any way. Has it changed recently? Has it been a sort of a second wave of response? Is that a new thing? Oh, absolutely. I think since Rock Hudson and since a lot of the media

exposure that's been over the last few months, we've seen an even greater response from people coming forward to offer their time or to offer their money. Sandy, Gay Men's Health Crisis was the first group in the country to have a buddy system working with people emotional support for AIDS patients. Who volunteers and why? I think the majority of people that come forward are still gay men who feel obviously very closely identified and want to help a group that they're very identified with. Although these same people are also working with very significant numbers of IV drug users. We also see a pretty high number of heterosexual women come into volunteer and more occasionally a heterosexual man will come into volunteer. Very recently though, the entire congregation of one of the Unitarian churches has decided to come in and mass and volunteer as a congregation. Sandy, to give our listeners an idea of what's going on at the Gay Men's Health Crisis, what are the focus of the activities that you head up? I head up the program

that provides the buddies and the crisis intervention workers, which are the people that do the one -on -one support for people with AIDS. I do two days of the training for new volunteers and I work with training outside agencies around issues of AIDS and I run a support group for people with AIDS. Sandy, what's it take to be a support person, a buddy at Gay Men's Health Crisis? All right, a buddy is a pretty specific role and it involves helping someone with the daily life tasks usually at their home. It takes someone that has a little bit of time, a lot of commitment and a willingness to be supportive and help in very practical terms. How do you help those people who do come to you in getting over maybe their fear of I think some people might still be hesitant right about, oh, can I do this safely? Can I help an AIDS patient? I think everybody comes in that way on some level or another. We have a pretty extensive three -day training program and usually all of those questions and

all of those fears are really addressed. We have people with AIDS come in and talk to the new group being trained and we have people that have been volunteers come and talk about what their experience has been like and I think that goes a very long way. Sarah Terry and I are talking to Sandy Fine, Bloom Assistant Director of Clinical Services at Gay Men's Health Crisis in New York City. Sarah? Sandy, what about the business community's response? We've heard a lot about discrimination against AIDS patients or concerns about discrimination. How are offices starting to come to you for information or background? I think many, many offices, many, many organizations are responding quite positively. I frequently get calls from different corporations or someone within a corporation saying I recently found out that one of my employees has been diagnosed with AIDS. What do I need to do to provide support within my corporation? Rather than say they want to fire somebody you're hearing how can they help? Oh, absolutely. What are some of the examples of the programs that they're providing at the workplace?

Well, I'm working now with one of the city agencies that came to me saying a couple of their staff had been diagnosed and what could they do and we're working on a program that would include enabling people to stay involved in their jobs even if they become sicker and need to be at home that they would arrange for people to be able to modify their jobs to work from the home and maybe the other people in the office would help being kind of informal buddies by bringing the work back and forth. They're putting together financial funds to assist people in whatever ways they can that perhaps the medical insurance doesn't cover and they're just we're setting up any number of programs that we can for them to provide support within their agency and we'll be doing a major educational form there to make sure we can answer all of the questions and any fears that anybody in the workplace has. Sandy, we've talked a lot about the response of individuals, church groups, businesses, any person getting involved. Can you tell me a little bit about the responsibility perhaps of an AIDS

patient and how he responds to the disease whether it's cutting back on a promiscuous lifestyle or how he deals with the public. Does that come up at all in your work? Yeah, I would say that it does come up. Many people that are diagnosed with AIDS did not have what anybody would call a promiscuous lifestyle. So for many people that kind of change isn't required. Most people I think that are diagnosed with AIDS do go through a very serious time of questioning their whole life values in a very very positive way. There's frequently a strong return to some kind of spiritualism whether that's religious or some other form of spiritual growth or change a very big exploration of the way they spend their time and the people that are around them and really what they want to get out of life and out of the time that they have remaining to them since nobody has any idea how long that's going to be. But a real questioning of values I think takes place. Sandy do you have much of a sense of optimism or hope in the work that you do it

seems like it could be pretty depressing? Well there are times that it's very depressing but yes I do feel a great deal of hope if I didn't I couldn't do this work. I do believe that at some point somebody will find a cure for this. I think that there are treatments that get improved all the time. I think people with AIDS themselves are finding many many very creative ways to keep themselves emotionally fit and healthy and we do see people now that have been diagnosed for four years or longer that are still around and doing well and most people handle this illness quite courageously so how could I do anything less as a as a health care professional. Sandy thank you very much for being with us on conversations tonight. Thanks a lot Sandy. Oh thank you for asking me to be here. We've been talking to Sandy Feinblum assistant director of clinical services at gay men's health crisis in New York City. Sarah and I will be back with Dr. Fauzi Ibrahim Fauzi right after this message. This is Bob McDonald and you're listening to conversations with the Christian Science Monitor.

Saraterian and I are going to conclude our discussion of how people are constructively reacting to the AIDS crisis with our final guest Dr. Fauzi Ibrahim Fauzi. Dr. Fauzi is a psychiatrist and assistant director of the neuropsychiatric institute at the University of California at Los Angeles. Dr. Fauzi earlier in the program as you know we've been talking with people about some of the constructive responses to the AIDS crisis and I know when I spoke with you before you said that education is the key to helping the public understand and yet you don't think we've done a very good job of educating the public do you? No I don't think so. I think we've done a moderately good job educating the professionals and specific groups of individuals like AIDS patients and the gay community but we have not done a good job of educating the public about the potential of contagion but also safe practices that they should not be afraid of coming in contact with an AIDS patient because you cannot catch AIDS by

being close to somebody so we've not done a good job so what we have we have really helped we have helped the fear propagate that you see every day you open the paper you see the virus was found in tears the virus was found in saliva the virus is found so that the people were left with the fear and with the fear that they could get it even from air but really nothing about how they can protect themselves. What would you like to see us do as far as improving the education for the population what are the steps that you think we should take? I think people should start to listen to the scientific merits of finding the virus in tears and then how they can protect themselves there's a big difference between us saying in the paper we found the virus in tears and also then quoting that nobody has contacted their disease by getting exposure to tears of AIDS victims so that there are some reassurance there that the presence of virus in tears does

not mean that you can get infected Dr. Fauzi you said something interesting when we spoke before about the fact that in terms of educating the public you can't just tell somebody don't be afraid you can't tell for example a mother whose child is going to school with an AIDS patient perhaps or you have no right to be afraid tell me tell me some more I think it's very important for us not to address fear with intellectual kind of brushing away and minimizing the parents concern throwing facts at them or telling them not to be afraid is not going to be an answer an answer is to sit down with a group of afraid parents and say what are you afraid of let me address your concerns using the facts that I know let me really respond to your fear by being sensitive to you first and then give you some facts in other words as they did it at case junior high school in Swansea, Massachusetts they they went about it the right way absolutely

I really feel that you cannot tell somebody was afraid don't be afraid but you say I am sorry you feel afraid but let's see what you should be afraid about and what you shouldn't be and then we can talk about it good point good point Dr. Fauzi what's at stake in terms of the fabric of society if we don't find a way to respond intelligently and with compassion to the AIDS crisis then if we start blaming the gay community for spreading their disease and going to the degree of getting them outside our society then they will not be the last group that this will happen to another group with another infectious disease will come up and they will be then blamed for it I think as a society we should pull our resources get together and try and correct the problem rather than finger point and blame some some specific group of individuals because of as you've said before as well that it could be a religious belief next time absolutely absolutely Dr. Fauzi we're talking

a lot about the responsibility of the media of society of individuals in responding to the AIDS crisis but what about the responsibility of the individual who has AIDS and how perhaps they curtail sexual activity or what is their responsibility to society that's a very important point that you just brought up my feeling is that those that have been sensitively treated and made to feel that they were not responsible for their disease have really participated in making very important decisions about modifying their sexual behavior when we say curtail sexual behavior it's very difficult what we want them really to do is to reduce their behaviors that can produce high risk in other words to to cut back on the promiscuity absolutely absolutely by thinking AIDS what we're trying to do is to say this is potentially lethal disease could you have safe sex so the message here is safe sex rather than no sex at

all are you finding that AIDS patients are responding positively to that yes majority of AIDS patients that I see respond very positively they're that you know one thing I'm curious about what's your opinion of the response in the gay community to the AIDS crisis I think it's brought the gay community together they really have taken that challenge head on they have mobilized resources to help each other it's been in a way a very positive response of the gay community Dr. Fauzi thank you very much for being with us tonight on conversations thank you very much Sarah bye bye Dr. Fauzi bye bye Sarah thank you very much for joining us tonight and helping us get an understanding of what people are doing constructively my pleasure Bob I enjoyed being here I'll be back with a preview of Monday Night Show right after this that's it for tonight's edition of conversations with the Christian Science Monitor as I said at the top of the show tonight we've looked at just three of the aspects of this complex issue later

next week we'll be talking with some religious leaders about the issues as they see it especially the questions concerning ethics and morality on Monday night we'll be discussing the prospect of a manned expedition to Mars with well -known astronomer Dr. Carl Sagan and monitor natural science editor Robert Cowan thanks for listening this is Bob McDonald for the Christian Science Monitor have a great weekend this has been conversations with the Christian Science Monitor produced in Boston Massachusetts and is a copyrighted broadcast hi this is Bob McDonald join me for conversations with the Christian Science Monitor tonight well -known astronomer Dr. Carl Sagan will be with us to discuss the prospect of a manned expedition to Mars monitor natural science editor Robert

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