NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #26/NN_1992_26.iso/spool/sci/med/aids/1993

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Subject: CDC Summary 11/10/92
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                         AIDS Daily Summary
                          November 10, 1992
 The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) National AIDS Clearinghouse makes
available the following information as a public service only.  Providing
this information does not constitute endorsement by the CDC, the CDC
Clearinghouse, or any other organization.  Reproduction  of this text is
encouraged; however, copies may not be sold.  Copyright 1992,
Information, Inc., Bethesda, MD
************************************************************************
 "AIDS Case Benefit Cut Let Stand" Washington Post (11/10/92), P. A1
(Biskupic, Joan)
     The Supreme Court yesterday upheld a ruling that permitted an
employer to cut the insurance benefits of a man who developed  AIDS, a
move that could have widespread impact both practically  and
politically.  The high court declined from reviewing a  controversial
federal appeals court ruling that said federal law  does not prevent
certain employers from making sudden benefit  changes to save themselves
money, regardless of whether  individual situations prompted the
reductions.  The case involves H+H Music Co., which slashed the health
benefits of employee John W. McGann from $1 million to $5,000 for
lifetime treatment of  AIDS.  McGann died last year, while he was
appealing a federal  district court opinion in favor of his employer.
In denying  review of the case, the Supreme Court followed the advice of
the  Bush administration, which last month said nothing in the federal
pension law at issue prevented H+H Music from adopting an  insurance
plan "that disadvantaged persons with AIDS for the  purpose of reducing
plan costs."  Justice Department attorneys  said that the recently
enacted Americans With Disabilities Act  might prohibit insurance-
benefit discrimination against AIDS  patients.   AIDS advocates and
others in the medical community  expressed dismay at the court's
decision, saying that the case  represents a loophole in the federal
Employee Retirement Income  Security Act (ERISA), which governs certain
health insurance  plans.  Employer groups have argued that unless
companies have  the flexibility to decrease health care benefits when
they become too expensive, they would be more inclined to opt for
minimal  coverage at the beginning.  Related Stories: New York Times
(11/10) P. A18; Wall Street Journal (11/10) P. A4; Journal of Commerce
(11/10) P. 9A; Baltimore Sun (11/10) P. 1A

"An Overwhelmed AIDS Center" Washington Post (Health) (11/10/92), P. 9
(Melillo, Wendy)
     Due to the overwhelming number of HIV-positive patients who  need
services, the staff at Washington, D.C., General Hospital's  center for
AIDS patients is overburdened.  Since the clinic  opened in 1988, more
than 1,200 patients have been treated, and   numbers are increasing at a
drastic rate as officials at prisons, mental health centers, and
homeless shelters refer more and more  indigent people with AIDS to the
center.  New patients who are  not seriously ill may wait up to three
months for an appointment. Also, funding for new drugs is difficult to
acquire.  The  center's staff says that it took 10 months to get funding
to  purchase DDI.  Among those people admitted to medical wards in  the
hospital, nearly 1 in 3 has tested HIV-positive.  Because  D.C. General
is the city's only public hospital, the AIDS center  is the primary
treatment facility for area AIDS patients who are  poor or uninsured.
It offers medical care, counseling, and  psychiatric services.  In
addition to dealing with the  frustration of growing AIDS caseloads, the
staff is often the  only emotional support for patients with no
financial security.   Approximately 75 percent of the clinic's patients
are unemployed, uninsured, or homeless, said social worker Rene
Hernandez.  The  center is funded mainly through a $700,000 yearly
appropriation  from the District Commission of Public Health, which
covers  equipment costs and staff salaries.  It also receives about
$100,000 in federal funds annually.   But D.C. General is already
operating at a deficit because 65-70 percent of the patients have no
insurance.

"Sea Is the New Frontier for Developing Drugs" New York Times
(11/10/92), P. C5
     Researchers are resorting to the sea to discover new sources of
drugs to fight AIDS, cancer, and other diseases, a scientist  announced
yesterday.  William Fenical, director of marine  research at the Scripps
Institution of Oceanography, said,  "Despite an investment of around $10
billion per year by the drug industry, we are realizing that
microorganisms in the soil are  reaching an end point."  He said that
some strains of  tuberculosis are becoming resistant to existing
antibiotics and  researchers who are studying bacteria, fungi, and other
soil  microbes are "frightened to death that we aren't finding new
things."  But at the 30th annual New Horizons in Science  briefing,
Fenical discussed the potential of obtaining medicine  from sea
microbes.  Scientists have been studying sponges,  corals, sea squirts,
and other sea creatures for ten years and  have developed some promising
drugs for cancer, arthritis and  inflammation.  Fenical warned that it
will be at least 5-10 years before marine microorganisms result in new
medicines because the  newly discovered compounds first must be tested
on animals.   Fenical's research, which was funded by the federal
government  and Bristol-Myers Squibb, has discovered that bacteria,
taken  from sea floor muds in the Bahamas, produce chemicals called
macrolactins, which in experiments stopped the growth of melanoma and
colon cancer cells and the herpes simplex and AIDS viruses.

"Johnson's Accuser: Magic Knew Earlier" Washington Post (11/10/92), P.
D2
     The woman who alleges that Magic Johnson infected her with HIV
says he knew he was infected eight weeks before applying for a  life
insurance policy for which he tested HIV-positive.  Newsweek magazine
has obtained a copy of a letter from the woman, only  known as Jane Doe,
to Johnson.  She says she wrote the letter on  Aug. 29, 1991, eight
weeks before Johnson tested positive for HIV and two weeks before he was
married.  The woman has filed a $2-  million lawsuit against the former
Los Angeles Lakers basketball  player.  Newsweek also quotes a friend of
the woman as saying  that she personally confronted Johnson with the
news on Sept. 12, at which time Johnson said he had read the letter.
Johnson has  admitted to having sex with the woman once in June 1990,
but  denied ever receiving the letter.  The letter reads, "I have no
idea when the bottom will fall out, so I must prepare now."  The  woman,
a health-office worker, adds, "So you see, I can't be a  silent voice
any longer, not even for you, Baby Boy."  The woman  alleges that she
tested negative for HIV three times since 1986  and had been abstinent
for eight months before having sex with  Johnson, said Newsweek.
Johnson's attorney, Howard Weitzman, has indicated that the woman was
promiscuous and could have  contracted the virus "from any number of
men."

"Rare Tree Used in AIDS Research Cut Down" United Press International
(11/09/92)
     Chicago--A rare tree in Malaysia that produces an agent that
seemed to prevent the growth of a form of HIV in laboratory tests has
been cut down, said a published report on Monday.  D.D.  Soejarto, a
plant explorer at the University of  Illinois--Chicago, discovered the
tree, called Calophyllum  langerum, in a Malaysian rain forest in 1987,
according to the  Chicago Sun-Times.  The newspaper added that a sample
of sap from the tree produced a derivative that was effective against
HIV-1  in tests by the National Cancer Institute.  Researchers said that
in low concentrations, the compound stopped the virus' effects on CD4
cells without damaging them.  The derivative also was  successful in
fighting against strains of HIV-1 that were  resistant to AZT and other
anti-AIDS drugs, but not against  HIV-2, researchers said.  Soejarto
discovered that the tree had  been cut down when he returned to the
forest.  He believes that  it was used for construction because it has
no history of  medicinal use by local people and has too many branches
to be  commercially valuable for timber.  The tropical forest contains
five or six species of Calophyllum trees.  However, none of the  other
samples Soejarto has researched has the potency of  calanolide, the
derivative from the Calophyllum langerum species  tree, according to
researchers.  Also serving as staff member of  the Field Museum of
Natural History in Chicago, Soejarto heads  teams of botanists who hunt
plants in Southeast Asia in hopes of  finding new medicines before the
rain forests are depleted.

"The Military and HIV Research" Washington Post (11/10/92), P. A16
(Smith, W. Shepherd)
     Congress would have never let a lobbyist persuade it to divert
money to the Army for AIDS research if it didn't believe science  was
doing all it could to thwart the epidemic, writes W. Shepherd Smith Jr.,
President of Americans for a Sound AIDS/HIV Policy in  Washington, D.C.
Jessica Mathews' Nov. 2 op-ed "Pork Barrel  Research" regarding gp160, a
promising HIV treatment, tried to  paint a corrupt and uninformed
picture of Congress, says Smith.   She talked about "ill-informed
legislators" but she discussed  neither the testimony given to Congress
on this issue during the  past several years nor the various briefings
Hill staffers have  participated in on the subject.  It is clear that
the lobbying  efforts of Russell Long were helpful to the product
manufacturer, MicroGeneSys, says Smith.  However, his efforts did not
ignore  the best interests of AIDS patients.  Most AIDS research has
been only focused on end-stage AIDS rather than the spectrum of HIV
disease.  Mathews seems to follow the National Institutes of  Health's
suggestion that the U.S. should conduct comprehensive  trials of the
most promising candidates as the "logical next  step."  But gp160 leads
the field in promising scientific data  and should not have to undergo
such a process.  Comparative  studies of vaccines will have value, but
not at the expense of  getting a potentially life-extending product to
HIV-positive  people as soon as possible.  The real message is that
Congress  does want to do more to help resolve the AIDS epidemic,
concludes Smith.

"Japan Confronts Sudden Rise in AIDS" New York Times (11/08/92), P. 13
(Sterngold, James)
     The Japanese government has finally conceded that the nation is
experiencing a sharp increase in AIDS cases and that it is not
invulnerable to the disease.  The government recently launched  new
programs to educate its largely uninformed citizens about  AIDS.  Some
of those involved in fighting AIDS say the efforts  are too late to
prevent the number of HIV infections from  escalating, and that the
programs are still insufficient.  They  have suggested that the
government undercounts those with HIV by  a large number and it is
contributing to the disease's spread by  withholding information from
those who have it.  However, they  did agree that the government seemed
to have at least taken a  step toward acknowledging that AIDS is not a
disease only of  foreigners, but also of Japanese.  In the past week,
Tokyo's  subways have displayed advertisements by the municipal
government advocating the use of condoms and encouraging understanding
instead of chastisement for those who are HIV-positive.  A  television
advertising effort has also been implemented using  renowned
entertainers and athletes.  Although the number of  HIV-positive
Japanese doesn't come close to those in the United  States, there are
new worries that the alarming increase in  recent percentages and the
pattern of its spread is similar to  other countries with a drastically
high rate of HIV infection,  like Thailand.  In Japan there were 238
AIDS/HIV cases reported  last year.  But in the first eight months of
this year, the  figure was 326, and more than 100 of those were in July
and  August alone, reports the Ministry of Health and Welfare.

"From the Food and Drug Administration: First Drug Available  Under
Parallel Track Policy" Journal of the American Medical Association
(11/11/92) Vol. 268,  No. 18, P. 2491
     The Food and Drug Administration-approved drug stavudine (D4T),  an
antiviral agent that functions by inhibiting HIV, has become  the first
investigational drug to be made available under the new parallel track
policy announced by the Public Health Service in  April, 1992.  The
policy permits promising new drugs for treating AIDS and other HIV-
related conditions to be more readily  available to those AIDS patients
who are unable to take  conventional therapy and are not eligible for
clinical trials.   Early clinical trials with D4T involving 259 patients
suggested  that the potential benefits of early expansion of use of the
drug outweigh the risks.  The early trials showed that many patients
experienced a temporary increase in the number of CD4 cells.   Many
patients tolerated the drug well.  One major side effect was peripheral
neuropathy, but this was usually reversible when the  dose was reduced
or the drug was discontinued.  The new parallel  track protocol will
require D4T to be available to patients who  have not responded to or
are intolerant of AZT or didanosine  (DDI) and who don't qualify for the
controlled clinical trial of  D4T that is intended to determine if the
drug can prolong life or postpone the onset of AIDS.  Participants in
the parallel track  study will include those who have experienced
serious side  effects from other antiviral drugs or whose conditions
have  worsened while taking those drugs.

"News in Brief: Georgia" Advocate (11/03/92) No. 615, P. 26
     Churches should involve AIDS patients in their services and
express compassion to families with loved ones dying of the  disease,
according to speakers at an AIDS forum on Sept. 27  sponsored by First
Baptist Church and Union Mission in Savannah,  Georgia.  Dianne Fuller,
chairwoman of the pastoral care  committee at First Baptist Church said,
"We wanted to foster  discussion.  We had the feeling the churches were
really silent  about AIDS."

"News in Brief: Oklahoma" Advocate (11/03/92) No. 615, P. 26
     State-subsidized distribution of AZT to needy AIDS patients in
Oklahoma will end on Oct. 31, as a result of a bureaucratic  foul-up.
The incident involved officials at two state agencies  who neglected to
report that the program was in financial danger, said state
representative Jeff Hamilton on Sept. 21.  Hamilton,  chairman of the
state house of representatives' health and mental health committee, said
that legislators were not aware that  federal funding for the program
was being discontinued when they  voted to terminate state funding for
it as well.  Separately,  Hamilton said Sept. 27 that public school
administrators across  the state are not actively participating in AIDS
education nor  are they properly abiding by the state's five-year-old
mandatory  AIDS education law.  The state education department released
a  report that suggested that students in Oklahoma public schools
receive an average of two hours of AIDS instruction annually,  which
Hamilton says is insufficient.  He said that school  administrators are
given minimal training on AIDS issues and that teachers fear they will
lose their jobs if they are frank in  answering students' questions
about the disease.

 *  The AIDS Daily Summary will not be published Wednesday, November
11, 1992 in observance of Veterans Day. Type Selection or L for list,