TV REVIEW : ‘Killer’: Putting a Face on HIV Statistics

Of the stories told in “48 Hours: The Killer Next Door” (tonight at 10 on KCBS-Channel 2), Joe Batchelor’s is one of the most poignant. The San Clemente man doesn’t have AIDS, but his wife died from it. His two small children also are infected, and he realizes what the outcome probably will be.

As the camera fixes on his weary face, the unemployed construction worker muses that “I may only have 24 months with my son.”

That moment, like many others in the show, makes you ache. There’s no question that “The Killer Next Door” is moving. This is responsible television doing what it does best, namely putting a face on our collective pain and anxiety over this indomitable disease.

But beyond the emotional impact, the episode can be frustrating. Producers Andrew Heyward, Rob Hershman and Linda Martin and their crew of reporters raise profound questions about the future of the crisis, but they don’t fully explore them. The limitations of this hourlong program are clear: With so much to cover, comprehensiveness is elusive.

“The Killer Next Door” begins with the much-reported fact that HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, is spreading among the heterosexual population. Filmed almost exclusively in Orange County--a region described by host Dan Rather, somewhat simplistically, as quintessential suburbia--the show operates from the valid assumption that anyone who is sexually active probably is fearful about AIDS.

A calm and reassuring presence, Rather asks these questions at the outset: “Should you be worried about AIDS?” and “What do we tell our children?” From there, we’re introduced to several people who have been affected. They gain our sympathy and set off an alarm; these are cautionary tales of what can happen anywhere.

Statistics underline the urgency. Rather notes that, according to federal records, one of every 250 Americans may be infected with HIV. As many as 40,000 Americans are expected to die of AIDS this year. About 4,000 new cases of HIV infections are reported each month. Orange County health officials confirm the program’s estimate that 12,000 people in the county have HIV, and that many may not even know it.

More than a little frightening, but “The Killer Next Door” doesn’t go much beyond the figures. It’s perplexing that during a brief segment on the drugs, both experimental and mainstream, being used to treat AIDS patients, we aren’t told what they are or why they may be effective. Even more frustrating is that no information is given on the status of AIDS research, or how far away we might be from a vaccine.

In another short segment, the producers even seem to contradict the contention that the disease is rapidly entering middle-class America. In an interview with journalist Randy Shilts, who detailed the early spread of AIDS in his book “And the Band Played On,” Shilts says that the media have exaggerated the “explosion” of AIDS in the heterosexual community.

Ultimately, the episode is more interested in the impact AIDS has on the lives of those who have it, and the telling visuals come at you with precision: Kimberly, who has AIDS, breaks down and talks about the guilt of infecting her young daughter. Kirk tells his parents over the telephone that he has the virus while distraught friends listen from the living room. Elizabeth, obviously very sick, gazes abjectly from a hospital bed.

In returning to one of Rather’s opening questions, “The Killer Next Door” also touches on the well-publicized controversy in Los Angeles and Orange counties over the distribution of condoms at high schools. While parents and campus administrators fret over what signal that gives adolescents, the camera follows AIDS educator Gary Costa as he tosses a box full of dildos to giggling members of Alpha Chi Omega, a Cal State Fullerton sorority.

Explaining that information equals protection, Costa graphically demonstrates the proper way to put on a condom. When asked if this kind of presentation is valuable, the young women suddenly become serious and voice their approval.

“It’s a matter of life and death,” one says, “and that’s the bottom line.”