Discrimination Against Those with AIDS

Employees are being discriminated against for their infectious illness

known as A.I.D.S. They are labeled incapable of performing the tasks they

pursued before they were recognized as being infected. The confidentiality of

an employee is a private matter and very personal. There aremany different

kinds of prejudice but not one as deadly as A.I.D.S Discrimination. The

emotional trauma and future ofemployment play a giant role in the inflicted.

Health policies through job-related fields must learn to recognize that like

other illnesses, A.I.D.S does not forbid an employee of performing his or her

duties. It is the most altering form of discrimination because of the fact that

every time a person finds out they are positive, the opinions of those who

surround them are likely to change. The working class is the most susceptible to

this form of discrimination. The every day environment of an employee with

A.I.D.S is also the work grounds for someone who isn'tinfected with A.I.D.S.

A.I.D.S Discrimination in a job-related atmosphere is due to lack of education

and sensitivity.

The infection of HIV does not reduce an employee'sefficiency from

satisfactory to intolerable. An employee should not be denied employment or

promotion if they are not flawed by HIV. Some employees are not stripped of

their capacities to perform even though they are infected with HIV(Lewy 2). Why

should the employee health benefits be altered because of the nature of the

disease. The majority of employee policies offered cover catastrophic illness

with only ten percent covering A.I.D.S. One particular policy states that

people do not become infected through usual behavior in a working environment.

This illustrates that A.I.D.S patients are protected under disability law and

are entitled to the same medical benefits (Karr A1). Policies must be issued to

protect the inflicted. A Department of Health and Human Services review board

has ruled "discrimination against someone who's HIV-positive is illegal" (Kolasa

63). Where does it say that unless the infected is under employment? The main

thing to understand is that it doesn't. Eileen Kolasa reminds us of a law of direct

meaning "HIV is a handicap protected under federal law" (66). The American

justice system is what decides the fate of the infected. The challenge of

bringing an A.I.D.S discrimination case in court has become very common in the

United States. Such actions have been victorious and have helped pass revised

Disability Acts which applies to all diseases (Annas 592).

Even though the infected are defended under law, it still violates a

person's human rights of personal health secrecy. This discrimination has not

received attention as aform of human-rights violation. The government and court

systems have helped essentially, but discrimination also affects medical care.