After 18 months on the job, Gail Horstein, AIDS coordinator for the Du Page County Health Department, Wheaton, has good news and bad news.
The good news is that county awareness and response to AIDS is improving. The bad news is that the number of AIDS cases in the county has increased from 14 to 40.
Horstein said, ”Du Page is a very educated community, and people here handle the education they receive very well.
”Back in February, 1987, I logged 178 phone calls, mostly from the worried-well, that is people who are at low risk of acquiring the disease, who wonder whether they can contract AIDS from a toilet seat or a mosquito bite. You can`t, of course, but whenever the topic came up on Oprah Winfrey or some other media outlet, the calls multiplied.
”No more. Residents here are learning the facts, perhaps in small doses, but they`re learning. I don`t think we`ve had a mosquito call for quite a while.”
Horstein, former learning-disabilities specialist, Northeastern University, and coordinator of AIDS support service at the Howard Brown Memorial Clinic, Chicago, added, ”I used to think you could start a project
(such as educating the county about AIDS) and finish it. No more. The nature of this epidemic being what it is, we are dealing with a scary subject and the need for behavior changes, things that require ongoing education because it means change and it takes awhile for it to sink in.
”In general, people faced with something like this need to hear about it at least five times-to dismiss it, then get a little interested, then get scared, then avoid it, then realize we`re talking about people with real lives who are dying, then to finally stop being scared and start dealing with it.
”That`s a wonderful thing about Du Page, though. Once they know that one of their own is sick, they are ready and willing to respond.
”That`s the challenge here-a community where we really have time to work on awareness and prevention. We don`t have 1,000 cases like Chicago; I don`t know that we`ll ever have that many. Chicago is knee-deep in people who are sick, in old programs in which participants don`t always get along, in money problems, bureaucratic problems. They`re just overloaded with people who are dying.”
She doesn`t want to see that happen in Du Page. She and her staff of four struggle to provide updated information, testing, counseling-small weapons in a war that will be won only when people change behavior that puts them at risk.
”We didn`t previously know that sharing needles, having uprotected sex and blood transfusions transmitted the disease. Now we know. Now we can keep the blood supply clean. But what about sharing needles and unprotected sex?” Horstein said.
”You know,” she said, ”educated though we are, the mentality persists that AIDS stops at the city limits. I know of adolescent boys sharing needles for steroid shots they take for athletics. I know of county cocaine users who only share needles with friends. I know of people who think multiple sex partners is okay as long as they only play around in the suburbs. They are putting themselves at risk. period.”
To help change such unenlightened attitudes, Horstein hopes her office can help county schools this fall implement AIDS education into the curriculum of grades 6 to 12 as mandated by the General Assembly.
”We are waiting for the State Board of Education to set the direction,” she said. ”We`re assuming something will be forthcoming this summer from the board. We have curriculums to offer, we`re here to help educate the educators, we want to do whatever needs doing. We`ll go just about anywhere we`re invited if we can focus on enough people at a time.”
”This really isn`t a moral issue; it`s a public health issue. I`ve heard very few people in this county call AIDS `the wrath of God.` They are smarter than that.”
Smarter, and apparently with growing compassion for the epidemic`s victims.
Several support groups, namely South West Aids Network (SWAN), Test-Positive Aware of the Fox Valley Gay Association and AIDS Pastoral Care Network of Du Page, Naperville, aim to support those afflicted and those affected, families of AIDS victims.
Horstein emphasized the need for more support groups while lauding the efforts of those in existence.
She said, ”The rabbis, priests and ministers of Pastoral Care Network are just great. I remember a young man who was reluctant to share his positive AIDS results with his priest, who had had trouble dealing with the young man`s earlier drug problem, since cured. The boy`s mom said to me, `If our priest had trouble with drugs, how in the world is he going to deal with AIDS?` The pastoral group put him in touch with another church where he was welcomed.”
In another case, a man told his mother on a Monday that he was gay and had AIDS. He died four days later of the of the disease, Horstein recalled. The support group again responded.
”So many needs are related, caused by this disease. We are trying to find the means to respond,” Horstein said.
”The pity is, when it comes to education, it boils down to money. We believe the most effective way to teach about AIDS is to incorporate it into the health class, the science class, the sex education class or anywhere that we teach our children about making choices. But who is going to pay for the manpower and the time required? Right now, there is understandable balking on the part of burdened teachers and reluctance on the part of some district schools. However, this epidemic isn`t like bubonic plague where you can kill all the rats and be done with it. It won`t go away until we understand and change . . . and that takes education.”
Referring to those who haven`t had the benefit of early AIDS education, Horstein said, ”I`ve spoken to adult men who have multiple, anonymous partners who refuse to use a condom because it doesn`t feel comfortable or it isn`t macho. We have to convince future adults otherwise. Being dead isn`t going to be macho at all.”
PUBLICATIONS THAT DEAL WITH AIDS
”Guidelines for Effective School Health Education to Prevent the Spread of AIDS,” Jan. 29, 1988, published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, outlines effective content areas. Among them are the following:
Early elementary-Program should be designed to allay excessive fears of the epidemic and of becoming infected.
Late elementary-Programs should teach what a virus is; AIDS is a virus that weakens the ability of infected people to fight disease; infected persons may show no symptoms and be of any race, sex or age; AIDS can be transmitted by sexual contact with an infected person, using needles an infected person used and from an infected mother to her child before or during birth; AIDS can`t be caught by touching someone with it, being in the room with that person or by donating blood.
Junior/senior high school-Among program`s subjects are: risk of AIDS is eliminated by abstinence from sex and intravenous drug use; persons who engage in sexual intercourse with persons whose infectious status is not known should use a latex condom (not natural membrane) to reduce likelihood of infection.
Other publications available:
”AIDS Education: Curriculum and Health Policy,” by William L. Yarber, Phi Delta Kappa Educational Foundation, Bloomington, Ind., available from Du Page County Health Department, 111 N. County Farm Rd., Wheaton, Ill. 60187, phone 682-7400. It presents a school curriculum that might be used by area schools. In addition to chapters ”Teaching About AIDS” and ”Instructor Qualifications for AIDS Education,” it contains a handy appendix of related curricula, audiovisual material, computer software, books and pamphlets, newsletters, hotlines, organizations and information sources.
”AIDS Current Awareness Service,” published biweekly, is a scanning service that highlights and abstracts current articles on AIDS appearing in 175 journals received at the library of the Du Page County Health Department. For further information, contact Jan Aleccia, librarian, 111 N. County Farm Rd., Wheaton, Ill. 60187. 682-7400, ext. 7373. The department also offers a variety of audiovisual aids and videotapes to schools and organizations.
