"Jeff Rigby" wrote in message
...


Last but not least, AIDS. Reagan is not to blame for this horrific
epidemic, or for the high cost to the nation in terms of lost lives
and lost productivity. What he is responsible for is the government's
callous failure to respond to this crisis in a timely manner.

AIDS should have been treated (locally) like a STD. If that had been done
the spread of the disease would have been slowed and hundred of thousands
would be alive today. Politics reared it's ugley head because Gays were
the
primary infection vector and you would be a homophobe if you were to treat
it like any other STD.

"If this was affecting straight men and women at the time, nobody
would have sat around," said Rene Durazzo, international program
director for the nonprofit San Francisco AIDS Foundation. "Reagan had
the power to make world- changing decisions. Because he failed to do
so, we lost hundreds of thousands of people."

If it were infecting Straights the Public health officials would have
followed up on infections and quarantined those who behaved irresponsibly.
They couldn't do this with Gays.

Can you imagine what the outcry would have been like if they would have
tried to quarantine gays that were infected, or closed down the bath houses
that were spreading it so rapidly. AIDS is mostyl tranmitted through
behavior, and there is no way the gay community would have let their
behavior be modified by law.