Nursing Home Sued For Refusing AIDS Patient

(New Orleans, Louisiana) Federal lawsuits were filed Tuesday against five Louisiana nursing homes that refused to admit a 50 year old stroke victim who has HIV.

A month before Cecil Little, 50, was discharged from the hospital where he underwent treatment for the stroke, his mother and his sister approached a nursing home within six miles of where they live. That facility, Tangi Pines, agreed to care for Little but after learning of his HIV status, just three days before he was due to arrive, the home backed out of the agreement.

Five other nearby nursing homes also refused provide care to him. Eventually, and out of desperation, the Little family had no choice but to move him into a nursing facility 160 miles round-trip from home--where he lived for four months.

In July of last year, Lambda Legal filed a complaint on Little's behalf with the U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services' Office for Civil Rights. (story)

Lambda argued that the nursing homes violated the Federal Rehabilitation Act that prohibits facilities that receive federal funds from discriminating against people with disabilities. Since these six nursing homes accept Medicare or Medicaid, they are bound by this law. Late last summer, Lambda Legal reached an agreement with one of the homes that initially rejected him, but agreed to take him in after the discrimination complaints were filed. The complaint against that home, Kentwood Manor, has been dropped and Little now lives within 20 minutes of his sister's home.

The five homes which continued to reject Little are the subject of the federal suit.

"What makes this case even more frustrating is that we are dealing with health care professionals here -- these are the people who should help dispel baseless fears about HIV, not perpetuate them," said Jon Givner, Staff Attorney in Lambda Legal's AIDS Project.

According to Givner, the circumstance faced by Little and his family is a growing and important issue as many people with HIV live longer and require different kinds of health care services--many of which have nothing to do with HIV.

http://www.365gay.com/newscon04/06/060104aidsSuit.htm

That just makes me so damn angry that a place where you are supposed to send your loved ones for health care would even think about refusing individuals based on their medical conditions :(

Regards,

Lee