A new bill Gov. Doyle signed into law Friday allows teachers and other public and private school employees to demand students take a blood test for HIV/AIDS if they come into contact with the pupil”s blood.
Although previous law stated that law-enforcement personnel, health-care officials and fire fighters could demand a blood test, the right has never been given to educators before. Wisconsin is the first state to initiate such a law, putting school-district employees and social workers in the same category as emergency workers.
The law has come under fire by critics who claim it is both an infringement on privacy and is discriminatory.
‘It’s not fair to anyone, with HIV or without HIV,’ said Amanda Wilkins, coordinator of students for Camp Heartland, the campus organization that fundraises and educates for the prevention of HIV/AIDS.
Wilkins said the new law signifies a lack of progress in combating ignorance surrounding the spread of HIV/AIDS and those infected with the disease.
‘As Wisconsin, we have always been a strong leader in taking care of people with HIV and AIDS,’ she said. ‘With a law like this, I feel like we are taking a step back 10 years. [Currently] there hasn”t been a large change in progress. The media is stepping back and not showing there is a need for education.’
However, author of the bill Sen. Carol Roessler, R-Oshkosh, said the legislation is necessary to protect the safety of those teachers who may have become infected with the virus from a student. A person”s right to know if he or she has contracted the disease should outweigh any other consideration, she said.
Roessler introduced the law after an Oshkosh Area School District student splattered blood into his teacher”s eye in October 2001. Many students at the alternative high school where the incident occurred had a history of drug use.
When the teacher requested the student submit to a blood test, the student”s parents refused. Eventually, a court order required the pupil to undergo a test, which turned out negative.
Wilkins, however, contends there is no legitimate reason why a student needs to undergo a test if it is the educator who is the one possibly infected.
‘The educator should be the one tested for six months out,’ she said.
However, President of the Madison-Metropolitan School District Board of Education Bill Keys said teachers should have the same opportunity to require blood tests as any other emergency official.
‘There are occasions when teachers have to break up fights or take care of students who are bleeding and find themselves in the same position that a nurse or dentist would,’ he said. ‘It seems to me that they should have the same kind of rights.’
Denying them those same privileges is discriminatory, he said.
‘I think to deny them the same rights is to treat them with second-class status,’ he said.
Keys admitted, however, that the law would only be legitimate if not abused, meaning teachers should only request blood tests with proper cause rather than just to learn if a student is HIV positive or not.
‘I assume that such a thing would not be used to investigate anything,’ he said.