Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1995. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
The Associated Press - 27 Jul 95
The bill to extend the program for five years passed by a 97-3 vote, but only after two days of assaults from Republican Sen. Jesse Helms against funding for AIDS research and treatment.
President Clinton welcomed the Senate action, saying "this vital program provides primary care to hundreds of thousands of Americans living with HIV and AIDS." The bill must still be taken up by the House, where controversy over mandatory testing has slowed action.
The Senate reached a compromise on the issue with language that encourages but does not require states to carry out testing of pregnant women and newborns for the HIV virus that causes AIDS.
Senators approved by voice vote a measure that requires the 11 states with the highest incidence of HIV infection in newborns to implement a program encouraging all pregnant women to be tested.
Mandatory testing is opposed by civil rights groups and state governments for privacy and funding reasons.
The American Medical Association favors testing mothers rather than babies, pointing out that treatment is available for infected mothers that can lower the possibility that babies will contract AIDS.
Helms won several minor victories, including passage of an amendment to scrap a requirement that all federal workers participate in AIDS prevention programs. Federal workers would still be able to participate in the program on a voluntary basis.
But the North Carolina lawmaker was defeated in attempts to limit funding for Ryan White programs to no more than the fiscal 1995 level of $633 million, and to require that spending on AIDS activities not exceed funding to fight cancer.
During the two days of debate, Helms blamed gay men for perpetuating the AIDS epidemic through what he called "incredibly offensive and revolting conduct."
But others urged greater understanding and sympathy for the sick.
"I think we have to recognize that there are weaknesses in society, but that discrimination is not the route that we ought to be going," said Sen. Paul Simon, D-Ill.
"We are all God's children and when we're sick we take care of each other. That's what this legislation is all about," said Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., one of 65 cosponsors of the bill.
The senators sent contradictory signals on another Helms amendment, to bar funding under the act for the promotion or encouragement of homosexuality or intravenous drug use. The chamber passed that measure, 54-45, but then also agreed 76-23 to another amendment, offered by Sen. Nancy Kassebaum, R-Kan., that prohibits funding for promoting any sexual activities, homosexual or heterosexual.
A House-Senate conference to work out a final version of the bill would probably have the job of deciding which amendment to accept.
But Elizabeth Birch, executive director of the Human Rights Campaign Fund, the nation's largest gay rights group, said she expected the Congress to take the Kassebaum language, calling it "a complete victory over Helms' effort to gut" the bill.
The act is named after a hemophiliac teen-ager who died after contracting AIDS from a blood transfusion. Since 1990 it has distributed money to cities and states for treatment and support of people with HIV and AIDS.
Voting against the bill were Helms and Sens. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., and Bob Smith, R-N.H.
Copyright 1995/The Associated Press. Reproduced with permission. Reproduction of this article (other than one copy for personal reference) must be cleared through the Permissions Desk, The Associated Press, 50 Rockefeller Plaza, New York, NY 10020.
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Copyright © 1995 - Associated Press. Reproduction of this article (other than one copy for personal reference) must be cleared through the AP Permissions Desk.
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