                     AIDS Daily Summary 
                       August 3, 1995

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (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, and the CDC
Clearinghouse should be cited as the source of this information.
Copyright 1995, Information, Inc., Bethesda, MD


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"AIDS Law on Trial in N.D."
"At 4, She Has Made Her Mark on World"
"Indonesian Moslem Chief Seeks Curb on Condoms"
"FDA Oks First Baboon-to-Human Bone Marrow Transplant for AIDS 
Patient, Despite Potential Health Risks"
"The Pop Life: A Death from AIDS Makes a Rap Group Examine Its 
Priorities"
"Sacrificing Babies on the Altar of Privacy"
"Healthcare Technologies Reports Record Quarterly Results"
"Atovaquone (Mepron) Suspension Approved by FDA"
"Resisting AIDS: Another Vaccine Approach"
"Compensation for French Haemophiliacs"
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"AIDS Law on Trial in N.D."
USA Today (08/03/95) P. 3A;  Pesce, Carolyn
     AIDS activist Cyndi Potete is the first person charged under a 
six-year-old law in North Dakota that makes it illegal for people
with AIDS to transfer body fluids without disclosing their 
illness and then using protection.  Potete, who faces 20 years in
jail after having sexual intercourse with a former boss who she 
claims raped her, is scheduled to appear in court today for a 
preliminary hearing on the charge.  Although it is not known 
whether the man she had sex with, Timothy Martin, has tested 
positive for HIV, proof is not necessary for a conviction.  The 
case has attracted attention across the country because of the 
controversy over state laws passed in the late 1980s to stem the 
spread of HIV.  Many AIDS activists contend that the laws are 
discriminatory because they classify people with HIV and AIDS as 
criminals, but ignore others with communicable diseases.  The 
incident took place when Potete, an alcoholic who had been sober 
and was on probation for drunken driving, went on a drinking 
binge with Martin and woke up in his camper naked and unable to 
remember what happened.  Potete was arrested after a friend who 
knew that Potete was infected saw her and Martin have sex 
reported the incident to Potete's probation officer.
      
"At 4, She Has Made Her Mark on World"
Washington Post (08/03/95) P. D.C.1;  Parker, Lonnae O'Neal
     Precious Thomas, age 4, has appeared at numerous AIDS awareness 
functions--including a World AIDS Day program at the General 
Services Administration, where she was a guest speaker.  
Precious, who was adopted by Rocky and Michael Thomas, was 
diagnosed with HIV at age 1.  Her birth mother was a drug addict.
"I have a bad bug in my body, and it makes me sick.  It attacks 
my immunity system," is how Precious describes her illness.  
Rocky Thomas said her daughter was constantly in the hospital in 
1992 and 1993 due to upper respiratory infections.  Precious' 
doctors and teachers discovered that she has a talent for 
remembering facts and figures, and it was at that point that 
Rocky Thomas began an AIDS awareness campaign and started letting
Precious do motivational speaking.  Thomas said that her daughter
is asked to give speeches at church or civil rights benefits 
every week.  "I'm not keeping my mouth closed about her being 
HIV-positive," Thomas explained.
      
"Indonesian Moslem Chief Seeks Curb on Condoms"
Reuters (08/03/95)
     Indonesia's Council of Ulemas (MUI) has urged that condoms only 
be sold to married couples through limited markets, the Antara 
news agency reported.  "It would be better if the government only
allowed dispensaries to sell condoms to married couples with 
prescriptions from general practitioners," said Hasan Basri, the 
MUI chairman.  Basri said the MUI could not support any effort 
for the use of condoms as an AIDS prevention measure,  because 
this would mean they would be sold freely at kiosks and shops.  
This would also mean that the MUI endorsed free sex in the 
predominantly Moslem country, which he said was prohibited by 
Islam.  Basri said that condoms were not needed to prevent the 
spread of HIV, noting that strong religious convictions would 
stop people from having extramarital sex.
      
"FDA Oks First Baboon-to-Human Bone Marrow Transplant for AIDS 
Patient, Despite Potential Health Risks"
Business Wire (08/02/95)
     According to the biotechnology daily BioWorld Today, researchers 
at the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF) will 
proceed with a bone-marrow transplant from a baboon into a human 
with advanced AIDS.  The newspaper learned late Tuesday that the 
Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had approved the transplant on
July 27, less than two weeks after a public hearing was held to 
examine the possible health risks of xenotransplantation.  The 
FDA removed a "hold" from the investigational new drug 
application held by researcher Suzanne Ildstad and professor 
Steven Deeks, provided that certain conditions are met.  One 
condition is that the researchers make a good faith effort to 
locate a baboon that does not have foamy virus, a particularly 
virulent disease that is fatal to most baboons.
      
"The Pop Life: A Death from AIDS Makes a Rap Group Examine Its 
Priorities"
New York Times (08/03/95) P. C12;  Strauss, Neil
     Released last week, "E. 1999 Eternal," the first complete album 
by Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, is one of the most interesting new rap 
albums of the year.  It is also important because its executive 
producer was Eazy-E (Eric Wright), who died of AIDS earlier this 
year.  Layzie Bone, a member of Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, said that 
the rapper was the first of the group's friends to die from AIDS.
"That was the first time that we ever ran across anything like 
that...[His death] makes you think about whether some things are 
really worth it, and what we've really got in the world," he 
said.  The band has recorded a single, called "In Memory of E," 
which will be on the B-side of an upcoming single.  Eazy-E was 
best known as a member of the rap group N.W.A, from which the 
top-selling rappers Ice Cube and Dr. Dre emerged.  Bone 
Thugs-n-Harmony's "E. 1999 Eternal" will enter the Billboard 
chart next week at No. 1.
      
"Sacrificing Babies on the Altar of Privacy"
Wall Street Journal (08/03/95) P. A8;  Ledeen, Barbara J.
     Each year, some 2,000 infants in America test positive for 
HIV--although many are false positives because they have their 
mother's antibodies, but not the actual virus--writes Barbara J. 
Ledeen, executive director of the Independent Women's Forum, in 
the Wall Street Journal.  These babies, however, are still at 
risk because they can also get the virus through breast feeding, 
she warns.  Currently, federal policies ensure that parents are 
not informed of the babies' disease.  AIDS activists and 
establishment feminists claim that the "privacy" of AIDS patients
should be maintained at any cost.  The solution to the problem, 
Ledeen proposes, is to directly and routinely test pregnant 
women, tell them the results, and teach them how to behave in the
future.  Recently introduced legislation in Congress would 
require HIV testing of all newborns whose mothers were not tested
for the virus, informing the parents or guardians of the results,
and counseling them about how to help their children.  But this 
is not enough, Ledeen declares.  If we can insist upon testing 
for hepatitis and syphilis, why not for HIV? she asks.  Although 
privacy is an important principle of our society, other 
principles should supercede it if its blind application threatens
the health and survival of women and infants, Ledeen concludes.
      
"Healthcare Technologies Reports Record Quarterly Results"
Business Wire (08/02/95)
     On Wednesday, Healthcare Technologies Ltd. announced record sales
and earnings for the second quarter of 1995.  Revenues for the 
three months increased 15 percent to $2,313,000 from the 
$2,015,000 recorded one year ago.  Overall sales for the first 
six months rose by 16 percent to $4,415,000, compared to 
$3,814,000 in the corresponding period in 1994.  Company 
president Dr. Yeshayahu Yakir said the increases were in part due
"to growth in sales volume of Sero ELISA, Chlamydia kits, 
Diaslide, [and] the initial sales of HIV kits in a number of 
countries."
      
"Atovaquone (Mepron) Suspension Approved by FDA"
AIDS Clinical Care (07/95) Vol. 7, No. 7, P. 62;  Cotton, Deborah
     Atovaquone (Mepron) suspension has been approved by the U.S. Food
and Drug Administration for the treatment of non-severe 
Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia (PCP) in patients who are unable 
to tolerate trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole (TMP-SMX).  A test of 
the suspension form of the drug produced a two-fold increase in 
bioavailability, compared to the previously licensed tablet.  At 
this time, atovaquone is not licensed for prophylactic use for 
PCP or for salvage therapy in patients not responding to other 
treatments.  In addition, a comparison of TMP-SMX and atovaquone 
for the treatment of mild to moderate PCP showed significantly 
more deaths in the atovaquone group.  Although it has not been 
explained, one possible reason for the difference is atovaquone's
lack of a broad antibacterial spectrum.
      
"Resisting AIDS: Another Vaccine Approach"
Technology Review (07/95) Vol. 98, No. 5, P. 23;  Shearer, Gene 
M.;  Clerici, Mario
     Seeking evidence of cellular response to HIV, Shearer and 
Clerici's team at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) studied a 
group of high-risk people who showed no traditional signs of 
infection with the virus.  They found that between 35 and 65 
percent of the various subsets of the group showed evidence in 
their white cells of "cellular immune activity."  The team then 
tried to determine whether an AIDS vaccine should depend on the 
body's cellular immune response, instead of the antibody 
response.  Several labs--including the one at NCI--have noted 
changes in the types of cytokines produced before an HIV-infected
person progresses to full-blown AIDS.  Cytokines are the proteins
that regulate the immune system.  The NCI lab found that 
production of the type of cytokines that primarily promote a 
cellular immune response falls before a person develops AIDS, 
while the output of cytokines that enhance an antibody response 
increases.  It was also found that most of the HIV-infected 
people who progress to AIDS quickly produce more of the second 
type of cytokines, whereas long-term nonprogressors produce far 
more of the first type.  The concept of a type 1-to-type 2 shift 
in most HIV-infected individuals has prompted researchers to 
consider treating them with type 1 cytokines, with other 
molecules that cause the body to increase type 1 cytokine 
production, or with antibodies to type 2 cytokines.
      
"Compensation for French Haemophiliacs"
Lancet (07/22/95) Vol. 346, No. 8969, P. 243
     In Strasbourg, the Court of Human Rights reports that the French 
government has agreed to "friendly settlements" in cases filed by
hemophiliacs who became infected with HIV via transfusions.  The 
decision was made based on the premise that the length of 
proceedings violated the European Convention on Human Rights.
      
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