Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1998. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Associated Press - Wednesday, December 9, 1998
The proposal puts in writing what some Centers for Disease Control and Prevention experts have long said: Reporting HIV cases by name -- just as full-blown AIDS cases have been reported since 1981 -- works best. But because of privacy concerns, states can pick their own method, the guidelines say.
Whatever states decide, they must also allow anonymous HIV testing because some people will only get an HIV test if it is totally anonymous, the guidelines say.
The government lists 11 states that do not offer anonymous testing: Alabama, Idaho, Iowa, Mississippi, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee and Wyoming.
The CDC already had told states they must start counting HIV cases instead of just full-blown AIDS cases so that health workers can get a better handle on the epidemic. But in formally telling states they can use their own methods for tracking HIV cases, the proposed guidelines ease some AIDS activists' concerns that reporting-by-name would be mandated.
The guidelines also set the first quality criteria to ensure states do HIV surveillance properly as well as also establishing privacy standards so that states properly protect their lists. They include such protections as eliminating paper records, using computer encryption techniques, limiting access to the lists and requiring penalties for violators.
The guidelines, published in Thursday's Federal Register, are open for public comment for 30 days.
Currently, 29 states track HIV by name. Three other states report children's names only.
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