Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1984. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Associated Press - Tuesday, September 18, 1984
Dr. Edward N. Brandt Jr. said the test will be useful in detecting whether donated blood contains the AIDS-causing virus -- enabling that blood to be discarded and its donor advised to stop giving blood.
But Brandt cautioned a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee that positive test results "will not necessarily mean you have" acquired immune deficiency syndrome.
Elaborating on his testimony, Brandt told reporters, "We are exposed to tuberculosis, but it doesn't mean you have the disease. If it is positive (the AIDS test) you say, so what? What do you do then?"
There currently is no effective treatment for AIDS and no vaccine, although Brandt said scientists are trying to develop a vaccine that could be ready in a few years.
Use of the test, which will be widely available in several months, also brought words of caution from Dr. David J. Sencer, the New York City health commissioner.
He called the implications of a positive test result "frightening" to an individual who may never have the disease.
"Will insurance rates or coverage be affected? Will the test be used as a method of discrimination? The answer to these questions is, unfortunately, probably, yes," he said.
AIDS, identified by Health and Human Services Secretary Margaret Heckler as the nation's top health priority, is characterized by a breakdown in the immune system. Victims then are susceptible to numerous life-threatening illnesses.
Last April, researchers announced they had located the probable cause of AIDS, a variant of a known human cancer virus called HTLV-III.
A process has been developed to mass produce the virus, which enabled development of the blood test and may lead to a vaccine.
Subcommittee chairman Henry A. Waxman, D-Calif., pointed out that while progress has been made, Reagan administrative budget officials rejected Brandt's request for an emergency $56 million in new AIDS research money.
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