[.38sw]

My husband used to work at a county clinic. You wouldn't believe the horror stories he had. He had been called to a meeting with the staff to decide how to "help" a woman who was HIV positive and kept having babies. She had several children, each one had a different father, and most of the children were HIV positive. She'd been counseled, to no avail. She continued to have sex with various men, and to have babies. My husband suggested that, at the very least, she be sterilized, so as not to bring any more HIV+ babies into the world.

Well.

He was asked to leave the meeting, in that he wasn't being "helpful". Can you imagine - an HIV+ woman, sleeping around and infecting who knows how many men, and producing HIV+ children, who are going to suffer and die, and the suggestion that sterilizing her isn't helpful? Of course, there probably isn't a legal way to sterilize her against her will, but isn't there a law against knowingly infecting your sex partners with HIV? I thought there was, but maybe California doesn't have such a law.

[sweetliberty]

I suppose it's some asinine thing about the woman's privacy, just like killing her babies would be. Some of the laws are so screwed up and are completely lacking in common sense. I'm a bit concerned because I've just learned that one of my foster kids may be pregnant. This is a bright, pretty girl with a tragic history. She's about to turn 18. I'm very worried that they will try to make me offer abortion as an option, which I would be unable to do. I'm hoping it won't come up. What I'm really hoping is that the girl isn't pregnant. I know she has some medical things going on which could account for the irregularities.

[ValerieUSA]

I'm sure the committee's conclusion about how to best help this woman and her children involved blaming Ronald Reagan for their plight.