A Caucus White Paper On Aids

Remember when seat belts were a nuisance that we all ignored? Remember when it was cool to smoke?

Remember when you first heard the term "designated driver?" I can promise you it was on television.

Information, especially information on a favorite television show, can, and has, changed human behavior. When Henry Winkler as the Fonz on "Happy Days" went to the library to check out a book the purchase of new library cards in the U.S. doubled.

Back in the seventies, notes from Standards and Practices at every network were specific. If a character got into a car, that character must either talk about using the seat belt or use it. Also cigarette smoking was at first flatly forbidden, and then strongly discouraged. Seat belt use went up and cigarette smoking went down.

Simple as that.

Now, the United States is at war. And the tragic fact is half the country doesn't know it. The enemy is a retro virus which mutates so frequently that a single cure cannot, so far, be found. A virus that is infecting 130 people in our country every single day. To put it more succinctly, every nineteen minutes. The virus is, of course, AIDS. The war, a fight against losing a generation of kids, most of whom don't know they're infected. Because, you see, the highest at-risk groups in this country right now are not homosexual men or I.V. drug users. We learn from the Berlin Conference on AIDS that the premier at-risk groups are heterosexual non-drug using women and teenagers. As reported September, 1993, on "Good Morning America," there has been a 152 percent increase in the past two years in the number of people infected through heterosexual contact. Last year was the first time ever that the number of women infected through heterosexual contact exceeded those infected by needle sharing.

Let me tell you about my friend Carol; a nice Jewish girl from New York who married her first lover and stayed married to him for twenty years until he dumped her for a younger woman, at which time her friends insisted she had to learn how to date. She dated exactly three men. One of them gave her AIDS. Or perhaps it was her husband. She contacted all four and all four denied being HIV positive. After that, none returned her phone calls. Carol did not drink and she did not use any drugs. She died in 1991 never knowing who gave her the disease.

Because females infect so much more easily, there are 22 new infections for every existing case of AIDS among teenage girls, as opposed to an eight to one ratio for boys. Since it takes an average of eight to ten years for the full blown disease to appear, this country faces an epidemic at the turn of the century unlike anything in our history.

There are informational specials on television. There are info-mercials all over the tube. Charity affairs are held somewhere every week. It isn't that our business is silent on the issue of the terrifying plague that faces us. It's that the public watches the shows, likes the music, nods at the stars and turns off. Nobody is really getting it. This is not Jerry Lewis and "his kids" where a $20 check can get it off your mind until next year. And this is not, as the indignant cab driver in San Francisco declared to me, "a problem they caused. They started it, let them take the consequences ." However it started is exquisitely unimportant now. Blame is unimportant now. This disease, in one way or another, belongs to everyone. It is everyone's problem. Spiritually, psychologically and yes, financially.

Our taxes are going to pay for medical care for up to twenty million AIDS stricken Americans in the year 2,000 at an average cost of $100,000 from diagnosis to death, unless we in the communication business can find a way to reach those who feel they are immune because they are heterosexual and don't use drugs. The case cannot be overstated. Behavior must be changed.

Simple as that.

In Chinese the word crisis is composed of two characters. Danger. And opportunity. We are in grave danger. And we have an opportunity to do something about it. It doesn't take a whole story line. Just a remark here. A joke there. A line or two in the right place with the right information about Caution, Condoms and Consistent Behavior. When you learn (from the Berlin AIDS Conference) that 90 percent of HIV infection worldwide has occurred from heterosexual contact, you know you are speaking to everyone. Will Smith could be adorable with the throw-away line, "No glove, no love." Roseanne could sound off to Jackie about some guy she's dating, "When you sleep with one dude who's been around awhile you're sleeping with a hundred other people. And one of them might have been infected. He'd never know. And you'll never know. Until it's too late. So be careful now, okay?" Tim and Jill from "Home Improvement" could quite conceivably have "that talk" with their oldest son and bring up the much maligned subject of celibacy as a preferred option--until you're very very sure of the other person. Brandon or Dylan from "90210" could fall in love with a girl who refuses sex because she watched her brother die of AIDS and she is just too afraid. Queen Latifah on Fox's new "Living Single" could come up with a funny throw-away line about her roommate's dating habits. Make it clever. Make it incisive. Just make it.

If every writer, director and producer who reads this can find within one appropriate show one appropriate moment to interject some new information, like pebbles in the stream, waves will be made. And soon perhaps a tide turned back.

The challenge is daunting. Change sexual behavior? Especially among young people who believe themselves to be invincible? Well, yes. After all, what are the options?

Remember when seat belts were a nuisance we all ignored?

Remember when it was cool to smoke?

Remember when night club comics got big laughs from jokes about drunk driving?

The more things change, the more they are not the same in the nineties. Climb on board. Together we can make a difference.

Joanna Lee, Co-Chair Caucus of Writers, Producers and Directors Substance Abuse and AIDS Prevention Committee