Public Health Policy and the AIDS Epidemic

The ballooning of the AIDs epidemic in Western nations has investigation into public policy: can past histories of response communicable and sexually transmitted diseases be applied to the control of and HIV infection? Is there justification for the exceptional treatment AIDS in public policy? In this article, Bayer recounts the American with AIDS policy in respect to testing, screening, the reporting of, the notification of partners, and the quarantine or prosecution of whose irresponsible behavior transmits or threatens transmission of infection. As AIDS has become less threatening to homosexual men, public officials have reasserted dominance in policymaking, producing a to apply traditional public health approaches to AIDS policy. concludes that exceptional treatment of HIV infection will become to justify, and that the end of HIV exceptionalism provides an opportunity to revitalize public health traditions. (KIE)