North Carolina GOP Lawmaker Seeks To Cut HIV/AIDS Treatment Programs

North Carolina state Rep. Larry Brown (R), whose controversial comments have offended members of the gay community in the past, has announced plans to remove HIV/AIDS treatment from state-funded medical coverage.

"I'm not opposed to helping a child born with HIV or something, but I don't condone spending taxpayers' money to help people living in perverted lifestyles," Brown told the Winston-Salem Journal.

Brown told the Journal he doesn't believe HIV/AIDS patients should be covered for diseases caused "by the way they live," saying that any patients who contracted such illnesses "sexual behavior or drugs" should pay the full cost of treatment themselves.

Brown caused outrage in the gay community last year when he blasted out an email to a colleague belittling an award by a North Carolina gay-rights group to then-state House Speaker Joe Hackney (D) and referring to gays as "queers" and "fruitloops."

"I hope all the queers are thrilled to see him," Brown wrote. "I am sure there will be a couple legislative fruitloops there in the audience."

The Charlotte News & Observer notes a rather significant point of contention regarding Brown's connection of HIV/AIDS victims to the gay community:

Recent statistics from the U.S. Centers For Disease Control show that about half of new cases of HIV/AIDS are contracted by people who are not gay, either through heterosexual activity or through drug use.

Comments

[joeyfoto]

06:38 AM on 01/30/2011

Bigotry has a long and dishonorable tradition in North Carolina — fortunately, in the 21st century, it has, finally, become a minority position.

[julibear]

02:06 PM on 01/19/2011

Unbelievable! So what about diabetes or COPD patients that contracted the diseases "because of the way they live"???? Smoking your entire life results in lung cancer--we should deny coverage and treatment because they caused that themselves. This man is EVIL and I sure hope the people of North Carolina reject this kind of bigotry and hypocritical rhetoric.

[mammon55]

12:05 PM on 01/13/2011

Brown told the Journal he doesn't believe HIV/AIDS patients should be covered for diseases caused "by the way they live," saying that any patients who contracted such illnesses "sexual behavior or drugs" should pay the full cost of treatment themselves.
-Brown

That which you do to the least of my people, is what you have done to me.

[joeyfoto]

06:44 AM on 01/30/2011

mammon55 wrote: "Brown told the Journal he doesn't believe HIV/AIDS patients should be covered for diseases caused "by the way they live," saying that any patients who contracted such illnesses "sexual behavior or drugs" should pay the full cost of treatment themselves." Then he quotes Jesus: "That which you do to the least of my people, is what you have done to me."

It's hard for me to imagine a time when these professional "Christian" politicians acted like people of faith, but the funny thing to me was that statement was made by a politician in North Carolina, the Medellín, Columbia of tobacco growing. I wonder if this genius feels the same way about treating lung cancer.

[Rosy]

10:58 AM on 01/13/2011

Because of "lifestyles"? So I guess that means he will also cut funding for any program that treats:
Any STD acquired by a straight person
Any obese person
Anyone who doesn't exercise frequently
Anyone who doesn't eat healthy enough (who gets to decide what is healthy enough?)
Anyone who smokes
Any pregnant woman (after all, this is a choice, right?)

[tcny]

10:35 AM on 01/13/2011

This being North Carolina, is he just as adamant about smokers who have developed emphysema or lung cancer via their "perverted lifestyle" be tagged with the full cost of their treatment?
Or is he still in denial that tobacco use has any adverse health effects?

[Soulsurfer]

09:49 AM on 01/13/2011

Big Surprise. Sounds like they need to put a little more money and effort towards their education in NC.

[jeremyfive]

09:35 AM on 01/13/2011

"Perverted lifestyles". This oaf is referring to all adults who engage in sexual activity? Even married couples and rape victims?

More tyrannical bigots on steriods like this one is precisely what we don't need in America. I'm from North Carolina, and I do not want to continue to travel, embarrassed about my state for its bigots, as I always was in the Jessie Helms era. Move along, North Carolina, we can do a hell of a lot better than this!

[Amishguy]

08:38 AM on 01/13/2011

Let's also cut cancer treatment for former smokers
Let's also cut heart, and high blood pressure, diabetes treatments for over weight people
Let's also cut trauma treatment for people who didn't wear their seat belts in accidents

Oh wait there would be outrage if someone tried those things. I guess he better stick to homophobic stereotypes when spewing his great ideas.

[trnimmo]

07:15 AM on 01/13/2011

These guys will never change, the sharon angles, sister sarah's and this guy. And they'll keep getting elected in many parts of the country. They can boo-hoo, hoo at memorial services like the ones yesterday, say gun sights aren't gun sights and even insists they didn't mean it 'literally" but at the end of the day, they're the same. Christian this and that, except for the people they hate, who are basically anyone who doesn't think/talk like they do. But, I digress.

[SuzDuJour]

03:33 AM on 01/13/2011

Clearly Larry wants to take out aid for lung cancer too, since it's caused by "lifestyle choice"?

[DanInALionsDen]

02:51 AM on 01/13/2011

To cut off funding for HIV/AIDs treatment would be an act no less violent than the shooting in Arizona, and would surely result in many times more deaths. There are a million ways to be cruel, and one can use a bill to commit mass murder just as one can use a gun.

[julibear]

02:08 PM on 01/19/2011

hear hear!!!

[okakura]

11:28 PM on 01/12/2011

Following his logic, I guess he's also opposed to funding treatment for diabetes and most forms of lung and cervical cancer.

[phread]

11:24 PM on 01/12/2011

wow this is spot on the money wasted helping people would be better used for more corporate welfare...

for this site:SARCASM!!!

[dpmol]

11:15 PM on 01/12/2011

Doesn't say something in the Bible about people in glass houses?
This, from the Bible belt. Sounds like the Belt is choking oxygen to his brain.

[Sandman911]

11:15 PM on 01/12/2011

After reading some of thse posts, there's one point i don't see being mentioned. AIDS/ HIV is a 100% self inflicted, completely preventable disease. Tax dollars should not fund self inflicted medical conditions. If we're to use taxpayer dollars to provide assistance, then we should spend it on unpreventable diseases that are not self inflicted.

[tman418]

08:59 PM on 01/13/2011

What about those born with it from infected mothers or those who receive it through a blood transfusion?

What about those with lung cancer? Women who become pregnant? Aren't those done by choices? What about those with an obesity related condition/disease?

[SharkD]

10:56 PM on 01/13/2011

I hope the next time you need medical attention, that the doctor/nurse practitioner refuses to treat you, because whatever is wrong with you is "100% self inflicted." (Nearly every medical condition is the result of *some* decision -- even if it was just the decision to get out of bed that morning.)

The 20-30 minutes spent waiting for the results of a rapid HIV test, after an accidental needle stick, are the most hellish 20-30 minutes you can possibly imagine.