                     AIDS Daily Summary 
                      April 8, 1996
     
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 National AIDS 
Clearinghouse, or any other organization. Reproduction of this 
text is encouraged; however, copies may not be sold, and the CDC 
National AIDS Clearinghouse should be cited as the source of this
information. Copyright 1996, Information, Inc., Bethesda, MD
     
     
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"World Wire: Ban on Abbott AIDS Test"
"Ilka Payan, 53, an Actress, Dies; Champion for Anti-AIDS Causes"
"Maneuvers Afoot to Ax HIV Ban in Military"
"Bill Seeks to Put Federal Stamp on AIDS Memorial" 
"Good Deed Came with Possible Danger"
"AIDS Rate Highest in Largest Prisons" 
"How to Save Babies From AIDS"
"Continuous Fluconazole Protects Against Oral Candida" 
"Kaposi's Sarcoma Study Starts"
"M. Tuberculosis Genome to Be Sequenced" 
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"World Wire: Ban on Abbott AIDS Test" 
Wall Street Journal (04/08/96)
     Switzerland has stopped using an AIDS test made by Abbott 
Laboratories Inc. after the test's accuracy was called into 
question.  The company halted deliveries of the test on March 25 
after it heard of false negative results being reported. Denmark, 
Germany, Norway, and the Netherlands have already stopped using 
the test. Related Stories: USA Today (04/08) P. 1D; Chicago 
Tribune (04/05) P. 3-1
     
"Ilka Payan, 53, an Actress, Dies; Champion for Anti-AIDS Causes" 
New York Times (04/08/96) P. B12;  Thomas, Robert McG. Jr.
     Ilka Tanya Payan, a Dominican-born soap opera star and New
York AIDS activist who had the disease, died on Saturday at the 
age of 53.  The actress was popular in the Spanish-language soap 
opera "Angelica, Mi Vida."  She became a lawyer in 1981, and 
practiced immigration law.  When she disclosed that she was 
HIV-positive in 1993, she shocked Latin Americans, whom she said 
were ignorant about AIDS.  Furthermore, she said had kept her 
infection secret for seven years because of the disease-related 
stigma in the Hispanic community.  Ms. Payan became an AIDS 
activist to enlighten others and was awarded for her work. 
Related Story: Washington Post (04/08) P. B6
     
"Maneuvers Afoot to Ax HIV Ban in Military" 
Boston Globe (04/08/96) P. 3
     A showdown over the law to force the discharge of
HIV-infected military personnel is shaping up in Congress.  Sens. 
Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) and William S. Cohen (R-Maine) 
attached language to the omnibus appropriations bill to repeal 
the law.  However, Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) said that House 
Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) is unwilling to support the repeal 
and anger Rep. Robert Dornan (R-Calif.), who wrote the provision. 
Supporters of the repeal have lined up unanimous Democratic 
support in the conference committee working to reconcile the 
House and Senate bills.
     
"Bill Seeks to Put Federal Stamp on AIDS Memorial" 
Washington Times (04/08/96) P. A3;  Billingsley, K.L.
     Rep. Nancy Pelosi (R-Calif.) has introduced a bill to make
the AIDS Memorial Grove in San Francisco a national memorial to 
people who have died of the disease.  "We are hoping that the 
legislation will be noncontroversial.  It has no fiscal impact," 
said a spokesman for Pelosi.  Under the measure, the secretary of 
the interior would designate the grove a national memorial, which 
California has done since 1989.  The memorial, a wooded 15-acre 
area in Golden Gate Park, was started by a group of people who 
had lost friends to AIDS.  Its Circle of Friends, begun in March, 
will include 2,200 names.  Promoters hope to raise $2 million to 
maintain the area, which is leased from the city of San 
Francisco.
     
"Good Deed Came with Possible Danger"
Washington Post (04/08/96) P. B3;  Argetsinger, Amy
     A man who had revived a fellow Amtrak train passenger by
giving him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation was notified Sunday that 
the patient had HIV.  The good Samaritan, a volunteer firefighter 
trained to respond to medical emergencies, said he had taken 
precautions to protect himself during the incident, including the 
use of medical gloves and a scarf to breathe into the man's
mouth.  The sick passenger stopped breathing as the train
approached Washington, D.C., on Saturday evening.  By the time an
ambulance team picked him up at the New Carrolton station, he was
conscious and breathing, and he walked out of a hospital later,
despite doctors' advice.  While still at the hospital, rescue
officials learned the man was HIV-positive.  The man who
resuscitated him contacted officials after hearing of their
attempt to reach him on the news.
     
"AIDS Rate Highest in Largest Prisons" 
Boston Globe (04/08/96) P. 9
     Inmates in the largest U.S. prisons are nearly six times as 
likely as other Americans to have AIDS, the Centers for Disease 
Control and Prevention reported.  The agency said that 5,279 
prisoners had the disease in 1994, which equates to 5.2 cases per 
1,000.  AIDS deaths among inmates in the largest city and county 
prisons and state and federal jails totaled 4,588 from the early 
1980s to the end of 1994.  Most of the prisoners were infected 
with HIV before they entered prison.
     
"How to Save Babies From AIDS"
Wall Street Journal (04/08/96) P. A19;  Yogev, Ram;  Harisiades, 
James P.
     While AZT is effective in preventing HIV in babies who have
not yet been delivered, requiring an HIV test of newborns will 
not help to prevent the virus, write Ram Yogev and James P. 
Harisiades of Chicago's Children's Memorial Hospital in a letter 
to the editor of the Wall Street Journal.  Yogev and Harisiades 
contend that the proposed Ackerman-Coburn amendment to the Ryan 
White Reauthorization Act, which would require such testing, 
should be replaced by a mandate requiring prenatal care providers 
to educate pregnant women about HIV and routinely test them for 
the virus unless they refuse testing.  They note that in-depth 
counseling should be provided to those women who test positive 
for the virus.  The authors conclude, "At minimum, every provider 
of prenatal care should be required to make the HIV test 
available to all pregnant women as a routine standard of care."
     
"Continuous Fluconazole Protects Against Oral Candida" 
Reuters (04/05/96)
     Duke University researchers report that fluconazole
(Diflucan), a triazole derivative, has demonstrated effectiveness 
in treating mucocutaneous candidiasis and cryptococcal disease in 
AIDS patients.  According to Alison E. Heald and her colleagues, 
the drug also appears to be an effective prophylactic for 
"deep-seated fungal infections" in patients with AIDS.  Heald 
notes that "the patients taking continuous fluconazole were more 
likely than matched controls to have had sterile mouth rinses... 
and the yeasts that were isolated were more likely than matched 
controls to be non-Candida albicans species."  The researcher 
further states that the findings suggest "that continuous therapy 
for prolonged periods can prevent the appearance of Candida in
the oral cavity in a significant number of selected patients."
     
"Kaposi's Sarcoma Study Starts"
United Press International (04/05/96);  Wasowicz, Lidia
     A clinical trial for AIDS patients with Kaposi's sarcoma, a 
cancer common among people with AIDS, to determine the benefits 
of a light-activated therapy is beginning at Stanford University. 
 The study will evaluate a photosensitizer, known as Lu Tex by 
Pharmacyclics, Inc., which homes in on diseased tissue and is 
then activated by light.  The drug, which produces excited-state 
oxygen molecules in diseased tissues when it absorbs light, has 
shown promise in treating other cancers.  The study involves 
injecting patients with the drug, then illuminating the tumor.
     
"M. Tuberculosis Genome to Be Sequenced"
Lancet (03/30/96) Vol. 347, No. 9005, P. 890;  Bradbury, Jane
     The Wellcome Trust is providing funds to scientists at the 
Trust's Genome Campus in the United Kingdom and the Institut 
Pasteur in Paris to finance the sequencing of the Mycobacterium 
tuberculosis genome.  With the genome, scientists expect to be 
able to increase the number of potential targets for therapy, 
especially important to deal with multidrug-resistant strains.  
The World Health Organization estimates that there may be 50 
million multidrug resistant cases worldwide.  Drug-resistant 
strains are prevalent in developing countries, but also exist in 
urban areas of the developed world.  Stewart Cole, the project 
researcher in Paris, predicts that a third of the genes sequenced 
will already be known and that their products will have a precise 
function.  Another third will contain known motifs partly 
indicating their function and the last third will code for 
completely unidentified proteins.  Cole estimates that the entire 
genome may be sequenced with the next year and a half.
     
     
