The New York Times - December 16, 1986
Kenneth B. Noble

It is believed to be the first time that the Government has screened for AIDS among people who are not its employees or part of the military or in jail.

Labor Department officials said they were concerned that the Job Corps centers might become breeding grounds for AIDS because many students had been intravenous drug users and some had had homosexual contacts. The Job Corps trains unemployed youths in residential camps.

The screening program would affect 40,000 fulltime students in 106 residential training centers throughout the country. According to the Labor Department, since 1965 more than a million youths have participated in the Job Corps, created under President Johnson's Great Society.

Reassignment Is Envisioned

Job Corps students who test positive for AIDS antibodies would be reassigned, "if feasible" to a nonresidential center, or a "comparable" training program, according to George Salem, the Labor Department's Solicitor.

In addition, Mr. Salem said, "The Job Corps will provide appropriate medical referrals to health facilities with expertise in the care and treatment of AIDS."

Labor Secretary Bill Brock has approved the program, but some details have yet to be completed, Labor Department officials said.

Asked whether AIDS cases had been been a problem so far, Lou Ann Burney, a spokesman, said: "We've had a couple of reports of diagnosed AIDS cases, and that's as specific as we can get. But since we haven't done testing before, we don't have any hard figures."

Rights Groups Are Upset

Told about the department's testing program, civil liberties groups expressed strong opposition, saying they believed the program would be discriminatory.

"It is illegal, it is unconstitutional, it is immoral," said Thomas B. Stoddard, executive director of the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, a nonprofit organization that defends the legal rights of homosexuals. Mr. Stoddard said the program violated the Federal Rehabilitation Act of 1973, which prohibits discrimination by the Federal Government on the basis of disability.

"It makes me particularly angry," Mr. Stoddard said, "because the population that the Job Corps serves is naturally wary of the Government anyway. The last thing they need is one more disincentive to participate."

Allan Adler, legislative counsel to the American Civil Liberties Union, said the program appeared to contradict a recent report by Surgeon General C. Everett Koop that rejected the idea of compulsory testing. "It appears as if the Reagan Administration is internally divided as to its policy regarding testing, and should not be instituting requirements that conflict with statements made by the Surgeon General," Mr. Adler said. Other Federal Programs Last month the Foreign Service announced a screening program for applicants, officers and dependants, the first by a civilian agency. The military began a screening program last year. The Department of Health and Human Services announced guidelines for private employers last year that opposed screening workers, including those whose jobs involved public contact.

The tests measure whether a person has developed antibodies to the AIDS virus, which would indicate exposure.

In a brief statement, Mr. Salem said the department's "comprehensive educational program" would involve 'teaching all Job Corps enrollees what the disease is, how it is transmitted and how to prevent its spread."

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