The AIDS Quarterly; The Education of Admiral Watkins; A Death in the Family; 101; The Education of Admiral Watkins

Slate It's quarterly show number 101. Winter 1989 duration 15:31 WGBH TV Boston. The human immunodeficiency virus is not in the strictest sense of form of life until it is inside a host body. It is no more alive than a rock or a stone. It is a protein coded mass of genetic instructions. One hundred and fifty times smaller than the white blood cell at the time. After penetrating it multiplies. Until the shell bursts. And. This continues for years. So by so the virus destroys its carriers immune system. The person becomes ill from a series of infections that are progressive with serious and rare and finally fatal. This is. A.

Line. On the page or. The story of one man's just. Being true to the operation. That. Was. A piece of cake. The. Frustration of not finding the truth. And the drama. Of a death in the family. I'd rather die I don't have a miracle. Got its. Funding for the AIDS quarterly as provided by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Resources making the difference in the healthcare of America. Good evening. I'm Peter Jennings and this is the first program in a new series on public

television. Four times a year we're going to use this medium and this place to seek answers and understanding about a subject we know so little about. This winter marks the ninth year of the AIDS epidemic. Forty five thousand Americans have died as the result of AIDS so far. Another million and a half of our fellow citizens have the AIDS virus. You'll hear most of the experts refer to it as HIV and although researchers are working on treatments everything they've seen until now suggests that nearly all of those who have the virus will develop AIDS somewhere on our planet. Someone becomes infected every minute added up. Let's get one thing clear at the outset. AIDS is a virus it's not a moral issue. And another thing we in the media have not always been very helpful to you in understanding AIDS. Take a look at how the media has been covering AIDS in these last eight years.

1981 no one paid much attention when five gay men were diagnosed with a mysterious new disease. By 1982 it was being called the Gay play a disease called Acquired Eman hemophiliacs Filiale called AIDS may be spread by routine. Remember all those rumors about how AIDS could be spread on the lips of a drinking glass carried by mosquitoes shaking hands. They were all wrong when they encounter AIDS victims and dismissed charges. Actor Rock Hudson has terminal cancer of the liver and he is being tested for AIDS. Rock Hudson died in 1985. Two years later media coverage of AIDS was at an all time high when half a million people marched on Washington angry because there was no national policy. Then look what happens. It's astonishing really.

The number of AIDS cases in the U.S. goes on climbing at a frightening rate. And the media coverage look at the bottom line. Ironically those demonstrations outside the White House in 1987 were in part tied to the fact that President Reagan had just established a commission to study the AIDS epidemic. It was dismissed as a political gesture. People believe the commission was stacked to produce a report that would not be critical of the administration. In fact a year later that very commission brought back a searing report a catalogue of failures and a slate of powerful recommendations. We'd like to take you on a journey now. It is a journey back and forth across the AIDS landscape with the man who wrote this presidential report. It hasn't been easy to reconstruct which will tell you how little attention the media paid at the time. We call it the education of Admiral Watkins.

In the fall of 1987 the members of President Reagan's commission on the AIDS epidemic prepared for their first look at the virus that causes AIDS. There were eight men and five women. Few of them had any depth of experience either with the virus or the people sick from it. That included the chairman James Watkins. I've always been health care. My kids are all healthy and fit. That's never been an issue with me. I barely know how to put a Band-Aid. I didn't like my annual physical examination. I thought they were demeaning at their most intrusive kind of examination. Like my doctor. So why put me on a commission. People would ask me what are your qualifications. I don't know. I didn't put me on here. I'm an American. I'm interested in people and I believe I can do the managerial work necessary to pull this thing together if you give me a chance. So.

Admiral Watkins was career Navy. He was a registered Republican a devout Catholic and for four years chief of naval operations. As a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He supported the policy in the military to test for the AIDS virus and reject recruits who were positive. In some quarters that attitude made him part of the problem. By the time the Commission held its first meeting twenty five thousand Americans had already died of AIDS. The commission was widely regarded as an empty gesture by the Reagan administration. Too little too late. How can I have trust in this commission when the homophobia and medical ignorance is well documented and my life will probably not be saved in time for your report from now. Man very sorry. For. A person with AIDS. I'm sorry a person with AIDS.

That's why I'm very nervous about there wasn't even a common language between the commission and the people with AIDS. I had no idea what troubled waters. To. Ask me to embark on this. And I didn't realize how little I knew. I would estimate in retrospect that I had about 10 percent of the issues surrounded and the 90 percent was very confused in my mind. In June 1987. Before they were through the Admiral and his commission would listen to hundreds of voices all across the country. They would come face to face with the realities of the epidemic. At a hospice in Fort Lauderdale Florida. After a month on the job Admiral Watkins would sit down for the first time and talk to a person with a. I came from my mother's house. Where is it. Or is that because of. The society. That. Is somewhat abhorrent to us.

Sexual promiscuity comes to the fore and we don't like that. So why do you want to be sensitive to those individuals who helped them. We had our own ideological biases in our own minds that were unconnected with the facts around the epidemic and that's dangerous to set national policy on that basis. The Commission knew nothing about the epidemic even less than perhaps what even the general public might know. The first concept you have to get across to people is that this is an infectious disease that is spread by very well-known mechanism of sexual transmission blood or blood products and mother to child in utero during gestation. It so happens that the virus was introduced into a population whose sexual activity in some segments of that population was a perfect setup for the spread

of a sexually transmitted disease. There is nothing intrinsic about homosexuality that is related to AIDS. In San Francisco where the gay community had found sexual liberation in the 1970s. Thousands of men had been infected before anyone had ever heard of AIDS. By the time the admiral paid a visit to San Francisco General Hospital the patient load was enormous. The hospital had struggled with the epidemic for seven years. The first signs of crippling pressure on the public health system. Dr. Paul Volcker has been ministering to AIDS patients since day one. I was impressed that they were most anxious to sit down and talk to patients. All too often I think people kind of breezed through here and use it for some political and I didn't get that sense with. At the bedsides here the admiral saw the different faces of AIDS. We see people who go from being very intelligent

conversant friendly people to being shells of humans. People have tumors covering their entire face to the point where they're not recognized by their family and friends. In any number of ways. This is just a horrible situation. I'm a cancer specialist by training and this is you know give me any cancer before you get any gains. There are time and time again where somebody says I was diagnosed with AIDS. My doctor said he didn't want to treat me. My roommate threw me out. My friend stopped coming to visit my lawyer told me to get another lawyer with him and I went to my clergy person for support. And that person didn't react well at all. Those of us that testified to the commission

tried to talk about the HIV epidemic as it relates to other social issues. There has been a consistent effort to try and make it us and them. Let's figure out who those people are and keep them away from us. And if we could just do that then we'd be safe. I don't know what happens and I can sit down at a dinner in my garden. The goodbye does turn. You know I just. What's the matter with me. You on the aftermath of the Boston Globe and you know. Why. I. Have. No idea. The Admiral saw parts of America. He had never had occasion to visit before.

In the inner cities. He found an epidemic spreading virtually unchecked among the country's more than a million intravenous drug users. In Hell's Kitchen the commissioners visited St. Claire's hospital. And here they saw a patient population that has shifted. Two years ago 70 percent gay males. Today 60 percent I.V. drug users. As the virus moves through a population which cannot pay for its own care. So many hospitals must struggle to cope. It's putting a tremendous strain on what people try to call the health care system which does not exist. If you look at the way health care is provided in this country taken out of it we don't have a cohesive system where we can readily access good company and outpatient care if you don't have a private doc you've got a major problem because you're going to wind up in an emergency room. You're going to get thrown into an inpatient you're at if you're sick enough no one's going to really be following you outside of the hospital. No one is going

to really be concerned with your continuing efforts that is when you throw wades into a disease that demands a great deal of resources and absolute coordination of services. It just comes apart. And that was the basic message that I guess the hospital wanted to impart to the commission and I think they heard this. After only three months. The scope of the epidemic. And where it was moving was clear. And the reality is that when America has a coal miner America has pneumonia. In the case of the HIV epidemic it is double pneumonia. And the admiral began to make connections between the AIDS epidemic and some of the other problems. Now we have more and more persons who are poor who are getting a disease called AIDS who want to take care of that. Where are those resources going to come from. Even more Washington D.C. is Commissioner to public health. Reed Tuckson spoke for many urban officials.

This country is serious about trying to solve the drug abuse problem more serious about solving the HIV problem. Then we must move to that point where we in fact can give people treatment on demand and treatment does work and people do get better. But in cities like Washington Tuckson testified the waiting list for drug treatment is as long as six months. And while you wait for the virus move on. Into neighborhoods already overwhelmed with poverty and drug addiction no drug education here no AIDS education either. And that means that in many hospitals like New York's Harlem Hospital which the commission visited. More and more sexual partners is I.V. drug users. And their children. Are sick. Why there hasn't been. I have no. Idea. Dr. Margaret Haggerty chief of pediatrics here would make a lasting impression on the admiral. Now we have a group of women who are infected who have infants.

As we have progressed in the epidemic. We have increasing numbers of women who are sick to death themselves. Who have children who are. Very ill as well. And indeed we as we care for them we have to care for both the mothers and the children becomes a really tragic situation. Some children who are here. For long periods of time because their mothers is. No one left to care for them so they live here. It is increasingly a disease of whole families. Daisy Perez has AIDS. She didn't even know she was infected until her second daughter was born sick when they were tested for the AIDS virus.

Both mother and daughter were positive. I did what I did. She's a beautiful baby. Why kill her. When she is so nice to me. So. How. Does this. I. Think. This is. This is. Why. I'm doing it. You know hey this is like. Like a headache you can take as far as kind of overweight. You know this. Is. A. Hazardous matter. It had been six months. Midway through their hearings in half a dozen cities they talked to almost 400 people are going to remain that way. Admiral Watkins

listened to the experts and the misinformed bad blood. It's a high risk area. We should have the right to request female blood spinning. Time and again we've heard from people who themselves had AIDS. I'm remembering how my husband died and I say to myself one day an AIDS patient who'd been abandoned the next a surgeon frightened of being infected. If I continue doing what I do in this situation then I'm doing it with no more than I have now. It is only a question of when I first got here. We kept stumbling on ethical hurdles all the way through our hearings charge during the hearings the American Medical Association reaffirmed the Hippocratic oath. That's an amazing event in itself. Why would they have to reaffirm the validity of the Hippocratic Oath when age was born. But they did. We

found out that maybe a third to a half of doctors in some of our major hospitals just in this area alone would not touch an AIDS patient with a 10 foot pole. And yet the Hippocratic Oath says you will treat the afflicted the sick and you take risks in doing it. The Admiral saw a crisis that was bringing out the worst in some of the best in others. I had a friend that I'd sort of lost touch with. What I found out was in the hospital I had been diagnosed with pneumonia. And I went to visit them. And when I was leaving. We thank you for coming. And then he thanked me for touching him. He actually said thank you for touching me. And that's happened to me two other times.

I can't even imagine. Being at a point in my life. That. I would be so grateful that someone was just touching me and holding my. Hand on my shoulder touching my face. That I would have to. Say the words thank you for doing that. That's why I'm still doing this. What the admiral was hearing from witnesses was actually happening in the country in Anderson County Tennessee. A 12 year old haemophilia boy was infected early on by the AIDS virus as the result of the transfusion of stuff that. He had had happened to more than half the country's hemophiliac gwain

Mowery young him Julia boy who was essentially thrown out of school not by the administration of the schools now by the parents and this was in the Bible Belt. So where are our pastors and our religious on this issue. Could. Not get medicine to. Go bottom. Scratching. I mean who's to say. We don't know what's going to happen. This happened a lot to get to this school is hoping and praying we don't go. Off. Trying to kill everybody. We. Are not meeting certain. Fundamentally acceptable ethical standards in our country.

Mr. Bailey not doing it we're finding mechanisms to work around them and trying to convince ourselves that what we're still doing is ethically sound when in fact it's not 700 miles away. In Florida three young haemophilia brothers with the AIDS virus were thrown out of school when no other kids were on it. We can go to the library and feel like they were by their peers about this stuff in school. A year after the Ray family discovered their son's infection someone burned them out. Mr. President. Hi my name is Brian. I have two brothers. I work here. One school already. We don't want to rehearse

any more. A hard time. My mom and dad are fine. No price. President Reagan had called the family just to say I want you to know that we condemn this violence that America stands behind you and we will not tolerate discrimination that would have done a tremendous amount to eliminate that sort of stigma and discrimination. The fact that it wasn't done may not ensure that it will be repeated but it allows the same conditions and factors which erupted in Florida to reoccur. Schram We've had witnesses from the time Abdal Watkins first joined the commission. He tried to establish exactly how many people in the country had the AIDS virus. To this day it's a question which has not been answered we're dealing with another one and a half million out

there which may or may not be the right number who were infected who really ought to be getting tested. He would come to realize that the stigma attached to AIDS made an accurate count impossible and too many people frightened to reveal they had it meant the epidemic could neither be measured nor stopped. You have someone who's infected who may be a bisexual man and he has sex with three or four women. We don't know the the efficiency of the transmissibility to those women. The only way you know that is to get a handle on who in this country is infected and to trace their sexual partners. Otherwise we're never going to get a real handle on the epidemic. And the virus. In San Francisco Admiral Watkins visited the speech center the council's runaway children. I think it's possible for you to get it. Here too. And yes it's possible it's possible for anybody really.

No one has sex. How old are you. Fifty. 15 17. Some of the first young people who have been infected are the most disenfranchised kids street kids. But the big difference for the street kids is it doesn't matter if they know because they're out there just trying to survive. So Dr. Karen hyne talked to the admiral about kids with AIDS first and then considerations about their health come about 20th on the list. In the last 12 months that there's a 100 and 14 percent increase of infection. Among Children under 30. Cases among adolescent stubbled and they use condoms these tricks. OK what about boyfriends. No. No. Oh no I just don't want it. That's kind of ironic situation is it because you're protecting your trick. We have friends when they go home.

So let's say you have only 26 tricks them halfway friends up here. We all have examples of adolescents with every known way of getting this virus including adolescent adolescents Fred. Fred lessons I feel as if we have this year next year and that's kind of it because once the virus is well established unless a community how will we ever reverse that. I had no idea of the link between. What is now defined as the underclassman nation. It was an emotional experience for me because I didn't realize the suffering the agony the rejection of denial. Were building were hardening the underclass. Now we're moving them in separate ways. We've got to save the next generation now. There are hope. On the day he was to present his report to President Reagan. Admiral Watkins called Harlem Hospital again to talk with Margaret Haggerty.

It was sort of a values check. And he asked about one particular child who had never left the hospital. And a wonderful smile and a wonderful face. And it was a wonderful little boy. Christmas Child. Born on Christmas Day. When the admiral came. A child was in intensive care unit an oxygen tent. But I said hold your hand up. Admiral. Give him five. Kids way. He was the I would say the epitome of the tragedy. He was sent here I suppose for a role to play to get our attention. He certainly did. These real world cases make a difference. It's like touching a name at the Vietnam Memorial. Why do we allow all these things to happen and not get stirred up about it and why are we waiting to we're in a

crisis situation social crisis to get onto these things. I think that we are being tested. About some rather core values of all the people and that we are a complex society of. Folks who in some sense want us to care about either all of us. That's what the nation in some sense has to do and that when one group of us is in trouble the rest of us. Are in trouble. And must must respond. If that if I'm right if that's our values. Those are our values. And how we care for these. Is a test of that system or we are the largest group of hypocrites this world has seen. I don't believe we are for. The Admiral's official journey. He came to an end in July of last year.

When he wrote to the president. He used the military language. He was so familiar with the enemy he said has captured the early ground but aides must be conquered. I believe that we have a national public health emergency. This is a major issue for the country. It is not just the HIV. It is the health care system that is woefully overburdened. It is a nation that has a specter of drug abuse pain all over his head and we haven't dealt with it. Well it's a nation that is frankly discriminating against other members of our society. I can't tell you the the passion that's out in this country waiting for the leadership to say we've got it in hand let's go. We'll be beyond the rejection the denial and the vilification of others and we'll get on to a war against the virus rather than groups and people. Think that over 61 years you pretty well cemented your

views but you don't. You're always in a learning process. I just wasn't exposed to. The tougher side of societal life. I've been in the close with the military too long. I feel that I learned a great deal about our society and. Probably softened some of my. Military views. But I'm working on this side of the of society's aisle. The military was a lot easier being chief of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff. It was a piece of cake compared with the. How true. But in both cases Admiral Watkins knew that he might be preparing for war. This report which the admiral gave to President Reagan George Bush has it now has five hundred and ninety seven recommendations among them anti-discrimination laws to protect people with AIDS treatment on demand

for all I.V. drug users. You can't get AIDS if you don't get it. Drugs and what amounts to a complete overhaul of the entire health care system which it is clear cannot cope with any national health emergency. We'll be back in just a moment. By special arrangement with the AIDS quarterly operators at the National AIDS hotline are standing by to answer questions. To refer you to resources in your area or to provide additional information. Call toll free 1 800 342. You know it took scientists almost no time at all to identify the AIDS virus but how long will we have to wait for the news of a cure. One of the basic obstacles to a vaccine is that the human immunodeficiency virus is just that it's a human virus. You could infect other animals with the AIDS virus but they don't get

sick which is why this white mouse is news. Scientists at Stanford and other research centers have given these mice the cells of a human immune system and for the first time scientists can now inject the mice with experimental drugs and vaccines rather than test them on people with AIDS. How to give you some idea of the urgency that people living with AIDS feel about the search for a cure. Across the country they are saying to the Food and Drug Administration look we don't have time to wait for years of testing give us whatever you have now. It's a lot of pressure on government. Laurie Garrett covers the AIDS crisis for the newspaper Newsday. There is a warehouse near Washington filled with experimental drugs. Its location is secret to keep demonstrators and the desperate away. Only one drug in this warehouse has the full approval of the FDA for treatment of the AIDS virus.

That drug is AZT. AZT is helping some people with AIDS live longer. But as Reverend Emmett Watkins has learned AZT is not perfect move. No matter what. I take that antibiotic because the easy to use so close because of the every four hours I've discovered it immediately causes vomiting nausea. It was very toxic for me. I became anemic. Have started falling asleep on a trading floor. Peter Staley cannot tolerate large doses of AZT So he's taking a variety of drugs. Not all of them legal. Also the illegal drug here in the bag is. Dextrin sulfate from Japan. I get this song. On the underground market. For about a hundred dollars a month. This fall a thousand people surrounded FDA headquarters demanding access to AIDS

drugs. Among them was Peter staling to review this is a crisis. The average life expectancy is two years. The average drug approval process for a drug is seven to 10 years. We think things can be sped up. We know things can be sped up. That's what we're working hard to do and when we get. Should or shall I say slammed all the time by people on the outside. It is hard. Some activists consider Dr Alan Cooper public enemy number one. She says someone has to make sure new drugs are safe. Remember thalidomide. The FDA didn't exist. These same trials would need to be done to demonstrate whether the drugs work or not what their toxicities are. You know so so that we can be able to help physicians treat patients with the disease. In fact just this month the FDA loosened its restrictions on aerosolize pentameter on a drug that helps prevent the kind of pneumonia that often kills people with AIDS.

Kanas Reverend Watkins feel about demands that the FDA make available everything in the drug warehouse. I have mixed emotions. I'm not in full agreement taking anything that you want doing anything. Right now the warehouse is shipping 80 for experimental drugs for clinical trials around the country for people with AIDS. The sight of all these drugs brings hope because a better drug might be here but it brings frustration because these drugs are still beyond their reach. You may have noticed that we refer quite automatically to an AIDS epidemic pandemic really. It's everywhere now. Which raises the question how many people really do have AIDS. I reporter Charlie Stewart found it is virtually impossible to get an honest count. Patrick Ireland lives in Kansas City Missouri almost four years ago. He took

a blood test which showed that he was infected with the AIDS virus. Soon he began experiencing some symptoms but it wasn't until this past year. After several years of being sick that he finally fit the government definition of an AIDS case. I knew I was not. Considered for AIDS and how. I want to say March but I've been sick for three years. Because I didn't have the right infections. I mean the infections I had were caused by AIDS but. I didn't have the right ones. Following the government's criteria. The government criteria for AIDS cases is set by the Centers for Disease Control and it is very specific. An individual must be sick with at least one of a specific set of infections. According to this definition. There are over eighty five thousand reported cases of AIDS. But Patrick Ireland's doctor

says this figure can be very misleading. The AIDS cases are simply the tip of the iceberg. They only represent a small proportion of the total number of people who are infected with the virus and indeed are carrying the virus and will carry it for the rest of their life. In Kansas City the iceberg Brewer is referring to would look like this. Five hundred and thirty one reported cases of AIDS since 1983. Below it are thousands of people like his patient who have been sick with AIDS related diseases but don't fit the CDC definition. And below that. Thousands more who are infected with the virus but don't yet know it. Gerald Hauf is the chief of communicable diseases for Kansas City. We believe there are somewhere between four and seven thousand infected people in the metropolitan area. And yet we only have 500 cases I think undoubtedly.

AIDS is not totally reported but it's one of the best reported of all diseases in history at the CDC. Dr. James Curran says their definition is the most comprehensive. It's not possible to measure all the people infected. These are often tabulated by health departments but this is not an accurate measure of the extent of infection. It's not an accurate measure because many people don't know they are carrying the virus and don't get tested. Others go across the state line where test results are not reported. And many like the homeless simply fall through the cracks. Despite the difficulties measuring the large number of infected people is cause for concern when the individuals who are currently infected out there start becoming ill and using the medical system in the community. We are going to have a major problem and in accurate reporting can love the public into complacency here until they realize that there's a problem. And how

we report the accurate numbers. It's not going to hit home with them. And they're not going to be worried about their children that are going to be worried about their friends. That's the beginning of this first broadcast we hoped we would accomplish something by sharing with you the conversion of a very public man Admiral Watkins. We're going to conclude by looking through another window this time into the life of a very private family. We're grateful to the pases who live in Salt Lake City because they allowed producer Ofra Bikel to share with us and with you what it means to have a death in the family. The idea that family is close to the heart of the Mormon religion.

To live a good life here on earth they believe. Without sin and you will be reunited later with your family. In heaven. Joseph and Pauline peace to be missionaries for their church. She's active in charities he's been a successful businessman and is the former mayor of San Jose California. Where they raised a family of seven children and thirty five grandchildren. From the standpoint of. Patient acceptance Joe Pace is also a physician. He's tall. When I talked with him. We talked about. His ability to be able to control what period of time he had left his son Malcolm was dying of AIDS this scenario from Malcolm is that he goes into the natural sleep by the end of the

week and then by the middle of the following week he will take his last breaths and be back with our Heavenly Father. They say I should be conscious in about four or five days and then Jeff will fall. And I'm I'm looking forward to it. Quite frankly you're tired. I'm tired. I'm tired of being a hospital rooms. And then I needed this time from when I came to Salt Lake. I needed that time to basically tie the Sams for Malcolm the loose ends began in the family. He was born thirty nine years ago. The fourth of seven children the youngest son of a strong and sometimes disapproving father.

He's always been a very kind nice obliging son. As far as meeting the goals that I had as his father there were some problems there. He started do some drinking and then he stopped. Go to church and the other boys have not done things that way but it was more complicated than that. His closest sister is Nicky Well Anathem came back from UCLA. He was so Torm says he developed reports of relationships with men that he couldn't with women he felt secure and safe with them. And he kept trying to deny what he was feeling and said Well I must be wrong. I just have to get my head together. And finally after I started writing the law school of five I said I'm not going to fight this anymore. And I started to practice a lifestyle of homosexuality in the Mormon religion.

Homosexuality is one of the greatest of sins. I kept blaming myself. I didn't know for what that had I been to protect either mother or to close another or to leave but had I done it wasn't my fault. But I thought it was a mistake and I was 100 percent positive he was wrong. It couldn't be. Not not now. I was totally blind got my son Malcolm lived a life apart in San Jose. He was a lawyer and an athlete. He traveled widely and he had a close circle of friends. Friends have been a tremendous asset in supporting him. They helped him whether through stuff that probably within other family could not have done. Niki saw it one way Dad looked at it differently. I felt that he was going to get AIDS I really did because I was

around as I said as a doctor and in the community as far as that aspect of our San Jose was concerned. San Francisco being so close by and the bathhouses there was a bathhouse down the street about eight blocks away. And every time I drive down there I go downtown and I could I would look to see if my son's car was there. I sometimes drive down at night to see if his if his car was at the bathhouse. This is probably graphically gives you some answers to how did I feel about this. I didn't feel very good. It was 18 months after he was diagnosed with AIDS. Malcolm who is now living and working in Nevada became very ill. Then he had an unexpected reprieve.

My brother was supposed to die. About a month ago we went down to Reno and the doctors said he has pretty terminal. That is. The classic classification on his chart. He will be dying very shortly. We made contact with family with friends to prepare them that we'd be having a funeral shortly. And lo and behold you know when you always say gosh I don't have a miracle if we could have something happen so she doesn't die. We got it. And that's what we've done for the last three weeks as we've played out this miracle playing out the miracle man bringing Malcolm back to Salt Lake City to grapple with all the emotions that had separated the family for so long. Forget. Where the other is you. Know he wanted to come home. His friends understood there were two pictures hanging in Malcolm's hospital room. One. His family of friends in California who loved him and with whom he shared the last years of

his life. The other of the family into which he was born the family he so wanted to please but which he felt he had somehow let down. I didn't want a family and my lifestyle was somewhat repugnant to my parents at that time but he had fought for their approval again and again in his work. And as a son or tied together in our family that you can separate from that is the. So yes it is a sign was a fool but also a business. Yes. I want to fool anybody but connect with the family the whole family from my father and my father in particular. Why you're here at the same time. And so they've had a lot of difficulties. And

one of them being that we came come from a family of high strivers. This disorder sort of and bred in us as we're young that show always would try to strive for the most. And. Malcolm was able to get a lot of greed a master's in law degree in taxation and different things and they ended up in the last couple of years working for my father. And in it there have been some difficult times and Malcolm always wanted his approval that he can be one of those successful members of the family. You know when I asked him what was the most important thing for him. What do you think he said. You ask him what's the most important thing about me. I think he would probably say that love of the family and the lives of his brothers and sisters. Now he said his father is a problem his father's approval. So this shows the burden that he's been

under all this time. I don't try to wiggle out of that. That's that's that's very interesting. Now playing the record back father's approval he imagined it would be lived all that time. Not feeling you had your father's approval. I've known that for off and on for times that he was fighting to get my approval. And it brings tears to his mother because she knew there were periods of time when I was not fair with him and his comments are very interesting. I'm sure a very appropriate challenge to myself to be better.

I certainly have had some failures in his life for. Instance. It's. I did search for my approval for years and years and years. I'm still getting your mail and I didn't give it to you. Sorting things out. That's the way it was say it was right. I did the best I could. And sometimes it wasn't very good that way. You like that. I love my son my religious beliefs. They don't

mix. That's called a conflict. There's no logical solution. For your problem. That's what I've had for years now. The disaster. I. Firmly believe in the precepts of my religion. But. He writes My son. Is. Always will be. I'm not going to pretend. That I. Rediscovered. The Mormon Church. But what I am. Finally relented is to accept the fact that there is a God and that it may be a Mormon God may be a child of God. May be a Jewish God who knows but I

am willing to accept that there is a higher higher. And that's what I'm accepting day by day. They were growing closer. That was the time for my father and mother to be able to really have their son in their arms. I mean they went through all that trauma thinking they did something wrong. It's time to talk about a lot of personal things that a lot of subjects that are special. Now in the last couple of years I've really come to grips accepting you as you are in my life and not trying to work full circle. You. Meet me. Now. Or. At the end of the calendar. You know.

It was the last afternoon of Malcolm's life. That no one knew it at the time. As usual the family came and went. Nikki was there so it was her younger sister Shawna and Shawna's husband. D. OK. OK. Of them are here. We always. Play. Together.

In the late afternoon. His mother came back. They waited. But Malcolm hung on. It was Friday night. Malcolm was fading fast and he kept saying let go. Go on. And as much as we tried to coax Malcolm into leaving Malcolm would not leave this mortal existence without my father there at his side. My father was there less than a minute and a half and Malcolm finally said enough is enough and he passed and dad is best tribute with all that has been said and done. The bottom line is he loves you and want you respect and you at that he had.

The pall bearers were Malcom's friends from California. His father wanted him there. I feel comfortable but now I. Can. Feel comfortable. Maybe I should have figured that long ago. Oh God our eternal father. We come together this bright sunny wintry day. Two days before the funeral it's his father change the wording of the obituary from Malcolm peace died of cancer. Malcolm payes died of AIDS. Edward pace. Operators of the National AIDS hotline are standing by to answer questions. To refer you

to resources in your area or to provide additional information. Call toll free 1 800 342. Salt Lake City and beyond. AIDS has become such a part of our national life. It is an enormous challenge trying to understand it which is why the AIDS quarterly will be back in the spring. I'm Peter Jennings. Good night. Funding to be. Provided by. The. Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Resources making. The.

The. The. AIDS quarterly is produced by WGBH Boston which is solely responsible for its content. For a transcript of this program send $5 to the AIDS quarterly winter 1989. Box 322 Boston Massachusetts 0 2 1 3 for the AIDS quarterly journal will be sent free with each transcript order