IMHO, the costs to society are huge and the government reaction confirms that big government sucks. I have moments, days and weeks where I can rant and rave about these costs, both financial and to our liberty as well as the next guy. I have been fortunate. I'm neither an addict nor terminally ill and I have to remind myself to be grateful for this on occasion. This story was one of those occasions.
BTW, the article didn't say he was gay. A friend of mine from high school had leukemia and required somewhat regular transfusions and contracted AIDS as a result back in the early 80's and consequently died shortly after.