Have you had your kid tested for HIV?

arbilad · Head Chef

Have you had your kid tested for HIV?

hiccups · Future Queen in Zion

Hey, that's a different article about the same incident I linked to in my "Teach them more than the DON'Ts" thread. I think the HIV testing is to cover their behinds now that they have knowledge of a threat. The school hasn't commented on how it might have been spread and though the most likely behaviors to cause concern would be sexual activities and needle drugs there are a few other possibilities.

I plan to just give my kids a lot of information and make sure they know which path is the righteous one. It's something where individual parents simply have to try their best and pray for guidance. I would be very careful not to ever imply that premarital sex is ever a good idea (along with talking about spiritual consequences and how it creates distance from Heavenly Father) but my kids are going to know about condoms.

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

I wouldn't want the school testing for HIV. I'd like to take them to my own doctor if I felt like they needed testing. Maybe needles are dirty... maybe they don't keep precise records... who knows what's going on there? It's a school, not a hospital. How did they know whom to test? Did some science teacher bleed all over the class or something?

And really, I don't like finding out anything from school AFTER the fact.

mirkwood · Senior Bucketkeeper

You know it's a good thing crap like that isn't happening here. The schools would learn to really hate me.

hiccups · Future Queen in Zion

You know, the newstory I referenced in the other thread http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,443715,00.html has a lot more information about what is going on.

Imagine if you are running a high school and get information that 50 of your students may be exposed to HIV. And that's just with the connections you know about. There could possible be more. What they are doing is offering all the students the option to be tested. And not so the school can know. It's the health dept that's running things as is appropriate.

"Students are being tested at six stations in the high school gymnasium, one class at a time. Only representatives from the Health Department are with the students, who are offered educational materials and a chance to ask questions before they are given an opportunity to be tested with a mouth swab, Hochstedler said. They may decline."

It seems to me that they are trying to do the right thing in a very difficult situation. If there are infected teens, those teens need to know. Treatment for HIV has come a very long way and there can be some major quality of life improvements through early treatment. And they need to know if they have HIV to keep from spreading it further.

Oh, and Coco, note they are using mouth swab tests. No needles. And it's not the school doing the testing. The school is just the location.

Organist · Senior Member

This was in the news here the day it came out. I'm glad to see the testing is going forward. I think the school district is doing a wonderful job handling a tough situation that most others would have tried to sweep under the rug. They are offering free testing, doing it in an annonymous way, and offering education. Can you believe that another football team didn't want to play them? Talk about your misinformation. Since we have comprehensive sex education, maybe we should teach it a little better.

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

Organist - are you saying you think it's *impossilbe* for someone to contract HIV in a full-contact sport like football, when you know the other team is HIV-positive? Cuz that's about what it would take to convince me to let my kid play that team... don't people ever bleed in football?

I don't trust the mouth-swabs either. When I went through my divorce I took a full five years of blood tests for HIV.

Organist · Senior Member

Yes, for all practical purposes it is impossible to contract HIV through football. You are probably more likely to win Powerball and MegaMillions on the same night. If a student told me he caught HIV through football, I would consider him a fibber.

There are two HIV tests. The screening one is great for ruling out disease: a negative result is pretty convincing, but a positive test will need to be confirmed with a more specific test. There is also a window period wherein the screening test won't pick up the disease, so if you've had recent risky behavior, 2 tests separated by several months are in order. 5 years worth of tests seem a little extreme.

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

Well, 5 years might've been extreme, but I was feeling more extreme than usual during that period of time. I was in the mode of "anything is possible and wouldn't this just be frosting on the cake?"

So does anyone know what the deal was in the high school - one slutty girl getting around? Some teacher giving needle drugs to a bunch of kids - what was it, anyhow?

(It does still get passed by needles, right?)

arbilad · Head Chef

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but isn't a male a lot less likely to catch AIDS from a female partner than a female is to catch it from her male partner? I'm not saying that it's by any means impossible. Just that aren't males usually the ones who spread the disease the farthest?
And yes, I know that there are AIDS infected prostitutes in Africa that are a large part of the AIDS problem there. But it just seems to me much more likely that the culprit in this school problem is a male.
And I'd still want the school telling me if my child was getting tested for AIDS. At the very least it would be an opportunity for the parents to talk about with their kid whatever risky behavior caused the risk.