Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1998. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
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The San Francisco Examiner; June 26, 1998
Larry D. Hatfield of the Examiner Staff
The ruling was the first AIDS-related ruling by the Supreme Court and only the second involving the 8-year-old Americans With Disabilities Act. "This ruling has incredibly important ramifications, not only for people with HIV but with all people with disabilities," said Benjamin Schatz, spokesman for the San Francisco-based Gay and Lesbian Medical Association, which has more than 2,000 physician members in all 50 states.
Tony Varona, chief counsel for the Human Rights Campaign in Washington, D.C., said Thursday's 5-4 ruling by the U.S. high court sent a clear message to health care providers that "discrimination against people living with HIV is scientifically unjustified and forbidden under law."
In New York, Tracey Conaty, spokeswoman for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, said, "The task force is thrilled with this decision, because what we've long known is that people with AIDS and HIV are discriminated against and deserve redress."
President Clinton said he was pleased with the ruling, adding that it "reinforces the protections offered by the landmark Americans With Disabilities Act for Americans living with HIV and AIDS."
On Thursday, the justices ruled in a Maine case in which a dentist refused to fill an HIV-infected woman's tooth in his office. The lower court had ruled in favor of the patient, Sidney Abbott, but the case was appealed on the question of whether asymptomatic HIV infection constituted a disability.
Saying it does, Thursday's ruling ordered the appellate court to reconsider its setting aside of the lower court's decision that dentist Randon Bragdon violated the ADA.
The ruling emphasized that it does not "foreclose the possibility that the Court of Appeals may reach the same conclusion it did earlier." In other AIDS-related discrimination cases:
*The state Supreme Court allowed Wednesday a suit by a bank employee with HIV who quit Wells Fargo when the bank stopped letting him telecommute one day a week.
*A San Francisco case similar to the one in Maine could be affected by the U.S. Supreme Court ruling. It involves an HIV patient who is suing UC-San Francisco for allegedly refusing to perform surgery on him because of his HIV status.
Writing for the majority in the Maine case, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy said, "HIV infection satisfies the statutory and regulatory definition of a physical impairment during every stage of the disease."
The dentist "had the duty to assess the risk of infection based on the objective, scientific information available to him and others in his profession."
In deciding whether a health care provider has violated the ADA, Kennedy wrote, "courts should assess the objective reasonableness of the views of health care professions without deferring to their individual judgments." The ADA, signed by President Bush in 1990, prohibits discrimination against the disabled in jobs, housing and public accommodations, including medical offices.
Bragdon argued that the possibility of HIV transmission from Abbott to him merited his refusal of treatment.
When he found a cavity near Abbott's gum line, he told her that his infectious disease policy was that he would not fill the cavity in his office but he would treat her only at a hospital at her expense. She sued, contending that the contagious and fatal nature of AIDS limited her ability to have sexual relations and bear children.
A U.S. District judge and the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals agreed. The ADA allows disabled people to be treated differently if they pose a direct threat to the health or safety of others, but public health authorities say there is no documented case of a dentist contracting the AIDS virus from a patient.
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