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TUESDAY. JUNE 20, pou;

AIDS Panel Offers Critical Repori

Group's Final Work Charges Government With ‘Dogged Denial’

‘Associated Press

The National Commission on
AIDS ended its work yesterday
with a final report and a warning.
Members said the last four years
left them frustrated—sometimes to
the point of tears—over prejudice
and inertia in dealing with the dead-
ly epidemic.

“I think a lot of people in America
don’t believe the roof is about to
cave in on them,” said Charles
Konigsberg. Delaware’s _ public

health director and a member of the ~

commission.

The commission was created by
Congress and started work in 1989.
In the years that followed, it be-
came the government’s nag.

“The failure to respond adequate-

lv represents at best continued dog-

ged denial, and at worst a dismay-
ing hidden and unvoiced belief that
this is ‘just’ a disease of gay men
and intravenous drug users, both
groups that are perceived as dispos-
able,” the commission's report said.

The disease has no known cure,
but members of the commission
said its spread is largely prevent-
able. Nevertheless, the panel’s rec-
ommendations on prevention, such
as sex education and making clean
needles available to drug addicts,
were largely unheeded.

“It’s a failure of political will to
carry out effective HIV prevention
programs,” said Don C. Des Jarlais,
a commission member who is a re-
searcher in drug addiction and the
spread of the human immunodefi-
ciency virus, which causes AIDS.

The commission, whose mem-
bers are from both political parties,
often criticized the Bush adminis-
tration for not doing enough about
the epidemic and for being squea-
mish about discussing subjects such
as homosexual sex. In its final re-
port, the commission said, “New
hope surged with the election of
President Clinton.”

The Clinton administration has
proposed a 1994 budget that in-
cludes $2.7 billion for AIDS re-
search, treatment and prevention, a
28 percent increase over this year’s
spending. The report said, howev-
er, that while Clinton was sympa-
thetic and had promised much, he
had yet to deliver.

Although members of the com-
mission have been openly critical,
they tempered their remarks after
Clinton’s appointment Friday of
Kristine M. Gebbie as the govern-
ment’'s AIDS policy coordinator.

“We're pleased that the Clinton
administration has finally started its
engine on AIDS,” said David E.
Rogers, the commission’s vice
chairman.

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ASSOCIATED PRESS

June Osborn and David Rogers led the National Commission on AIDS, which

For some commission members,

- the disease is more than an abstract

public health menace. The Rev.
Scott Allen, a panel member from
Texas, lost his wife and a son to
AIDS. He has another son and a
brother who are infected with HIV.
“Have we reached the point where
an unacceptable epidemic becomes
acceptable?” he asked.

And for Mary Fisher, HIV is even
more personal: She has it. A year
ago, Fisher brought the Republican
National Convention to silence as
she lectured the delegates on the
pain of AIDS and the danger of de-
nial. She did so again yesterday at a
news conference where the com-
mission report was released.

Fisher contracted HIV from her
former husband, who died just over
a week ago. She cried as she de-
scribed taking her sons to stand at
the grave of their father. “I will not
go passively or quietly,” she said.

_ said the government has failed “to respond adequately” to the epidemic.

She offered advice to the Clinton -
administration: “Lead. Stand up and
speak for those hundreds of thou-
sands whose voices have been
stilled.”

[In response to the report, Sec-
retary of Health and Human Ser-
vices Donna E. Shalala told report-
ers that she had had breakfast with
AIDS commission members yester-
day and had said, “Keep criticizing
us,” Washington Post staff writer
David S. Broder reported.

{“In light of what is a worldwide,
terrible tragedy, everybody ought
to keep our feet to the fire and
make sure we are doing everything
possible,” Shalala said. “Until we
have a vaccine, a first-class educa-

tion campaign and a strategy for ___

changing risky behavior that leads
to AIDS, any criticism is justified,
and ]'m not going to be uptight or
resentful.”]