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A National Review of Court and Human Rights Commission Decisions, Part I: The Social Impact of AIDS

Lawrence O. Gostin, JD

JAMA. 1990;263(14):1961-1970.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

NO OTHER infectious disease in recent history compares with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection in the ways it has affected our relationships with each other and with our social institutions. Sharp differences in perception of public health, ethics, and civil liberties have created the largest body of legal cases attributable to a single disease in the history of American jurisprudence.

Litigation related to the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) impacts powerfully on the major social institutions of our nation—schools, health care, the blood supply, the judiciary, prisons, and the military. The litigation has an equal impact on cherished constitutional principles of privacy, freedom of speech and association, and liberty. The HIV epidemic even reaches into intimate personal relationships, sparking litigation against sexual partners and family members.

This article is the first in a two-part series reviewing 469 cases that are decided, settled, pending, or filed at the federal, state, and local . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

Author Affiliations
From the American Society of Law and Medicine and the Department of Health Policy and Management, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, Mass.

Footnotes
Reprint requests to American Society of Law and Medicine, 765 Commonwealth Ave, 16th Floor, Boston, MA 02215 (Mr Gostin).

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