The New York Times - June 17, 1984

Her condition deteriorated and she lost weight. After extensive tests, doctors found that the girl, whose name is Tracy, had AIDS, the disorder that attacks the body's immune system. Soon after, the foster parents told hospital officials they were giving Tracy up.

Children like Tracy, beyond fighting a deadly illness, have become social outcasts because of unwarranted fears about the contagiousness of AIDS, according to doctors, social workers and the families of the children.

Young victims of AIDS have been left in hospitals, some by mothers who have died or are dying of AIDS, they said. Others were accepted back in their homes only to be excluded from schools, dentists' offices and contact with neighbors.

'Worse Than Leprosy'

"One foster mother let too much information slip out," said Arye Rubinstein, a pediatric specialist in AIDS at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx. "Soon neighbors made AIDS out of it. People living in the building would not touch the railings on the stairs and not allow their children to play with the child.

"The end result is that innocent bystanders are totally isolated from the world. It becomes worse than leprosy."

AIDS, which stands for acquired immune deficiency syndrome, was originally thought to be confined largely to promiscuous homosexuals and those using drugs intravenously. But it was detected in babies as early as 1981, and doctors now know that children can contract it in utero from infected mothers or through blood transfusions from infected donors.

Tracy is one of seven AIDS children abandoned in New York City hospitals for whom Special Services for Children, the city's child welfare agency, is seeking foster homes, said Arthur T. Hilson, the director of the agency's Office of Placement and Accountability. He said he knew of no successful effort to find a home for an abandoned AIDS child.

Nowhere to Go

New York City, however, has no place to house abandoned AIDS children outside of its hospitals, Mr. Hilson said. One girl born to a woman with AIDS more than a year ago has been in Harlem Hospital ever since, he said. The mother is dead.

Tracy's doctor, Aditya Kaul, said her condition stabilized last Christmas. "She could be out of the hospital, but she has nowhere to go," he said.

Even with the attention and gifts of dolls and stuffed animals that nurses lavish on her, he said, her emotional and physical development were delayed because of the hospital setting.

Young AIDS victims are prey to a host of bacterial and viral infections, according to Dr. James Curran of the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta. Three reported cases have involved malignancies, and other symptoms might include an enlarged spleen and liver, chronic pneumonia and enlarged lymph nodes. Called Not Highly Contagious

Doctors emphasize that the AIDS virus is not highly contagious. "It is clear-cut that the AIDS virus is of extremely low infectivity," Dr. Rubinstein said. "You will find AIDS children who were sharing one toothbrush or sleeping in one bed with siblings, and yet the disease wasn't transmitted."

Officials at the Centers for Disease Control have counted 57 children nationwide with AIDS, 39 of whom have died. Dr. Pauline Thomas, an epidemiologist for the New York City Health Department, said 29 children in the city met the Federal criteria for AIDS.

These figures are disputed as too low by some pediatric immunologists, such as Dr. Rubinstein, who contend that the Federal definition of AIDS is unduly strict. The Federal Government counts only children who have a malignancy or "opportunistic" infections - infections caused by agents that pose no danger to healthy people but can be deadly to the immune-deficient.

Dr. Rubinstein said he was treating 44 children with the disease. Dr. James Oleske of St. Michael's Hospital and the Newark College of Medicine said he had 18 patients and six more suspected cases.

Yet the crucial issue, according to those who care for these children, is not one of numbers but of how society responds to children with a serious medical problem.

One Girl Welcomed Home

Doris Williams of Plainfield, N.J., is caring for a foster child with AIDS. In one respect the girl was lucky. She had been living in the Williams household for more than a year when she was diagnosed as having AIDS about two years ago. After the diagnosis, Mrs. Williams welcomed the baby home and then fought for her rights.

Now that she is 4, the girl's head barely reaches the shoulders of her healthy sister, who is an identical twin.

Dr. Oleske, who is treating the girl, said she contracted the disease before she was born. Her mother, he said, took drugs intravenously.

He said the case of only one identical twin having the disease proved two medically significant points: that a childhood immune deficiency can be acquired - which is central to the definition of AIDS - and that not all children born to mothers with AIDS get the disease.

Mrs. Williams, 46, has been a foster mother to 18 children over the past 10 years, and the twins share the home with four other children of similar ages.

Would Not Give Up

"I never agreed to take care of an AIDS baby, but by the time I realized she had special needs, I grew to love her," Mrs. Williams said. "I wasn't going to give up on her."

Mrs. Williams said the girl had encountered numerous problems outside her home. She said nurses had refused to come near her, dentists had rejected her as a patient and one medical technician had refused to take X-rays.

Last November, Mrs. Williams said, the Plainfield Board of Education discovered that the girl had AIDS, and the she was removed from a preschool program for handicapped children.

Because Mrs. Williams said she planned to sue the district, officials from the school system were reluctant to speak.

Dr. Everett Lattimore, the Acting Superintendent, said the Board of Education was seeking to find a private tutor for the girl or to place her in another district. These efforts have not been successful.

Boy Expelled From School

In the Bronx, Adrian H. said she preferred to keep quiet about her 6-year- old grandson, Eric, who is in her custody.

"I don't go around talking to anyone - you know how people are," said the woman, who is 72.

Because of AIDS, she said, Eric was expelled from a private school last year. She said she intended to enroll him in a public school next fall without informing school authorities about his illness.

Eric does not speak because an attack of bacterial meningitis left him nearly deaf when he was a year old. But he is an active child, with a dark complexion and expressive eyes. He gestures with his hands until he gets his point across.

"I love him 'cause he's special," said his brother, Aaron, 9. "He plays tag with me. He can draw. He can write. He can do anything I can do. He shows me things I don't even know."

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