Page 3512 - Week 13 - Thursday, 26 November 1992
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MRS CARNELL (12.05), in reply: I think it is very unfortunate that this debate has progressed the way that it has, or it had until Ms Szuty brought it back to some semblance of sanity. This is a public health issue. I think we all know and understand that it is a public health issue. I think that the current legislation in the ACT has been badly misrepresented in this debate. The Public Health (Infectious and Notifiable Diseases) Regulations and all the associated legislation that goes with them have very definite privacy requirements in them now. In respect of all of the diseases that have been notifiable and infectious over the years, I believe that the privacy provisions that are in that legislation have stood us in the ACT very well.
Mr Moore: They have been different, Kate. They are curable.
MRS CARNELL: That is not strictly true, Mr Moore. Diseases like hepatitis B, which certainly has some connotations, is notifiable in the ACT and I do not see on the front page of the Canberra Times or anywhere else stories of the people who happen to be suffering from it. I do not hear any claims that people are not coming forward to be tested for hep B or for a number of the other diseases involved. I believe very strongly that our legislation is very good and does protect the privacy of the people involved. It also protects the rights of others - not just the right to know, but the right to be educated on how to live with very difficult conditions, and there are a lot of them.
But HIV, as is rightly said, at this stage is not treatable. It is not just a matter of information down the track if the doctor who did the testing believes that somebody who has been diagnosed as HIV positive has not told their spouse. I think somebody who has been tested HIV positive, when asked, "Have you told your spouse or your family?", will say yes, and that is it. Under this new legislation that is the end of it. All a person has to say is yes, and nothing more happens. Under the legislation that used to apply to HIV, actions were taken that would have protected - - -
Mr Berry: No, they were not.
Mr Connolly: Gary just told us the story of how it does not happen - Gary's sad tale.
MRS CARNELL: That should have happened, I said; not did happen. That should have happened under the old legislation. That is supposed to happen. The doctors involved could do a number of things, and they included education. That would have protected Trisha Goddard because she would have been informed early in the relationship, not after the death. Her own comments suggested that, if she was informed, then they would have practised safe sex and therefore she would have been substantially safer. As it turned out, she was very lucky. Many other women will not be lucky if they are not given the opportunity to be told, to be informed, and to be educated.
This is not about some form of great hysteria. It is about having regulations that are sensible and that will protect both the people who have HIV and their contacts - not in some heavy-handed way, but in a way that will educate people on how to live with a disease that is very much a problem in our community, and will continue to be one for a period. I have to admit that, if the Government had
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