‘86 Coalition Re-Forms to Fight AIDS Initiative

A coalition of Orange County political activists who in 1986 helped defeat the controversial statewide AIDS initiative, Proposition 64, have begun a campaign to defeat another ballot measure they are referring to as the “Son of Proposition 64.”

The 1986 measure, which voters rejected 71% to 21%, called for quarantine of anyone with acquired immune deficiency syndrome. The new initiative differs in that it calls for wider quarantines, not just of people diagnosed with AIDS but also for anyone who tests positive for any AIDS-related virus.

Its placement on the state’s June primary election ballot was spearheaded, like Proposition 64, by leaders of Prevent Aids Now in California (PANIC), a Los Angeles-based group with close links to political extremist Lyndon H. LaRouche Jr.

Pat Callahan, an officer of the recently reactivated Orange County AIDS Initiative Committee, said the committee hopes to raise $75,000 to ensure the defeat of the latest measure. The money would be used, she said, for a telephone campaign and for mailings.

“We just can’t believe it’s back,” Callahan said of the new measure. “It didn’t make medical sense two years ago, and it doesn’t make sense now.”

Callahan accused LaRouche supporters of doing “the people of California dirt” by putting the new initiative on the ballot. But the measure’s advocates rejected that assertion.

“We think it has a better chance of passing now with a different group of voters who have a much better general knowledge of the issue,” said Khushro Ghandi of PANIC.

Ghandi said that the discovery of new AIDS viruses in the last two years have alerted people to the seriousness of the AIDS epidemic and that more people are calling for more stringent prevention strategies.

The 1986 measure was opposed as unnecessary by numerous groups and individuals, including gay rights organizations, the California Medical Assn., Gov. George Deukmejian and U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop.