posted
I think the subject line of this thread is a little misleading. I expected to find a tragic case of misdiagnosis. But the article doesn't claim that the man was treated for Lyme, or that he wasn't treated for AIDS.
The focus is what the parents told the fiance. She says they told her he had Lyme and heavy metal poisoning, and they never told her he had AIDS (which the fiance believes they knew all along and is the basis of her lawsuit).
Sad story.
Posts: 621 | From US | Registered: Jun 2006
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quote:Originally posted by ldfighter: I think the subject line of this thread is a little misleading.
I have to agree .... he wasn't being treated for Lyme.
-------------------- sixgoofykids.blogspot.com Posts: 13449 | From Ohio | Registered: Feb 2007
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CaliforniaLyme
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posted
What a tragic, tragic story- thank you 8man-!! *************************************************
Case of AIDS, secrets heads to Illinois supreme court
Suit before state's high court filled with complex legal, moral issues
By John Patterson | Daily Herald Staff 11/19/2007
SPRINGFIELD -- Imagine the nightmare.
Your son has AIDS. He brings home his fianc�e to meet the family and you think she's great. But soon your son's health is deteriorating and his fianc�e asks what's wrong with him.
Do you have a responsibility to tell her? What if you lie?
These are among the many questions being put to the Illinois Supreme Court as the justices ponder what to do in a case with far-reaching legal and moral implications.
On the surface it boils down to whether a Cook County woman is entitled to collect a $2 million judgment she received against her fianc�'s parents for allegedly misleading her about their son's health. He ultimately died and she too ended up with AIDS.
Had the parents been honest, the woman claims she would have sought testing, learned she was HIV positive, sought treatment and possibly stopped her infection before it progressed and irreversibly destroyed her immune system to the extent it has.
In response, the parents claim they too didn't know until their son's final days. Their attorneys question why an intelligent woman wouldn't simply get tested rather than base her health decisions on the parents' word.
And AIDS activists say had the parents spoken up, they would have violated a state law strictly protecting the confidentiality of those with AIDS and HIV and could have been sued by their son. In fact, the woman in this case is kept anonymous, referred to only as Jane Doe in court records because of this law.
"This would just throw that all out," said Ann Hilton Fisher, executive director of the AIDS Legal Council of Chicago, which filed legal documents backing the family in the appeals. "We've just basically said we no longer put a premium on confidentiality."
It's a showdown of nightmares. Parents confronted with the reality of outliving a child and quite possibly in denial about why. A single woman in her 40s finding love only to learn the man she hoped to marry kept a secret that would not only kill him, but potentially her as well.
Legal experts say it is the first case of its kind anywhere.
The family's attorneys say if the verdict and $2 million award stand, it will open a legal Pandora's box that could result in any perceived lie becoming the basis of a lawsuit.
During recent arguments before the state's high court, David Novoselsky, one of the family's attorneys, said if indeed the parents misled the woman it was wrong. But that's a moral issue for them to reconcile, not the Illinois Supreme Court.
"Is it a sin? Yes. We're now converting it into law," Novoselsky told the justices.
"If this is converted from a moral duty to a legal duty ... we're now getting into theology," he said. "This court ... should not enforce morality."
Supreme Court Chief Justice Bob Thomas questioned where it would stop if this verdict stands.
"Are we going to open up every human relationship to litigation?" asked Thomas.
But the attorney representing the infected woman rejected such arguments as legal red herrings that distract from the underlying issues. Alyssa Campbell said the law has long held people responsible for what they say, especially if their lies result in harm.
"Once you speak, you must be truthful," Campbell told the court.
According to court records, the two met via a personal ad in April 1996. He was 41. She was 44. She'd tested negative for HIV in 1991 as part of an insurance exam. He'd apparently known since at least 1992 he was HIV positive but didn't tell her.
After a few months of dating, the couple was talking of marriage and babies and first engaged in unprotected sex in late August 1996. At that point the fianc� was committing a crime. Illinois law requires those diagnosed with HIV to inform their partners of the risk of infection. There were never any charges because he died shortly after his fianc�e learned of his status.
Also in August 1996, she first noticed her fianc� appearing unsteady on his feet. And within weeks she experienced flulike symptoms often associated with the onset of HIV infection. She did not go to a doctor.
Over the following months and years, her fianc�'s health would dramatically worsen while the woman was repeatedly told by his parents, one of whom was a prominent food and drug attorney, that he was suffering from heavy metal poisoning and, later, Lyme disease. The parents handled their son's care.
Meanwhile, the woman's health also deteriorated. By the end of summer 1999, her hair had begun falling out, her gums were bleeding and sores appeared on her skin, all of which she attributed to the stress of caring for her ailing fianc�.
It wasn't until November 1999 that the woman, at a doctor visit with her fianc�, learned that the man she'd been with for more than three years was HIV positive. He died of AIDS later that month. She also tested positive.
Initially, the woman sued her dead fianc�'s estate only to find he had nothing. She then sued his parents, acknowledging it was their son who infected her, most likely before she even met them, but claiming they knew he was HIV positive and had a duty to not mislead her.
The woman claims the parents are to blame for her infection remaining undetected and untreated and progressing to full-blown AIDS.
She claims she once said to her fianc�'s mother that, "If I didn't know better I would say he looked almost like a man who has AIDS. Could he have AIDS?" The woman said the mother assured her he did not.
The mother denied that conversation ever occurred. She and other family members also denied a former son-in-law's claim that he heard the parents talking about their son having AIDS almost a year before the fianc�e learned.
Ultimately a Cook County jury held the parents liable and awarded the woman $2 million. An appeals court overturned the verdict and award, saying it was never proven the parents knew their son's HIV status and it was unreasonable for the woman to base her health decisions on the word of her fianc�'s parents, who weren't medical professionals, especially when she could easily have been tested.
"A prudent adult in a new relationship who is aware of STDs would be concerned under such circumstances about having been infected with HIV," the appeals court said in the ruling that set the stage for the current Illinois Supreme Court appeal.
Justices gave no indication of when, let alone how they would rule. There is no immediate deadline for their decision.
-------------------- There is no wealth but life. -John Ruskin
All truth goes through 3 stages: first it is ridiculed: then it is violently opposed: finally it is accepted as self evident. - Schopenhauer Posts: 5639 | From Aptos CA USA | Registered: Apr 2005
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oxygenbabe
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I'm glad to have read it anyway. This is murder (on his part) and the parents may be accessories to murder. Why is it that confidentiality is allowed with an infectious disease that can be fatal? The fellow who had resistant tuberculosis was practically quarantined recently... Because of the social stigma, that still exists, its unlawful to say someone else is infected? Even when you are preventing harm? Something's very wrong here. What a horrible story.
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CaliforniaLyme
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Yeah, we had a guy in the last place I worked who was HIV+ and who infected people on purpose- it was a VERY BAD SCENE.
The distrcit attorney was going to prosecute him if he infected someone new but those laws are all very murky and hard to deal with. He was completely unrepentant and kept trying to pick up women in our facility.
Unfortunately, he was a sociopath and he was VERY handsome- and VERY VERY VERY CHARMING. Incredibly good-looking, incredibly smart, incredibly SEXY. Wish it weren't so... And you would never ever have guessed that he WASN'T a WARM, LIKABLE human being.
Unless you had read his file. Then it was like, HOLY HOLY )!&!^@!!!! And you would see the female clients SWOON over him and you would go HOLY HOLY HOLY because with all the liasons in laundry rooms those could be fatal- AGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And you could not say a WORD. NOT ONE WORD, to the 19 year old innocent woman swooning over him in delight at his attention- NOT ONE WORD!!! AGH!!! Except, "You know clients are not allowed to get into relationships with each other." which to a 19 year old is "GO HONEY GO!" So you can't say anything- at all-
But just do bed checks every ten minutes!!!!!!!
I saw him out & about a while ago, walking down our main street downtown- and shivered thinking of the innocent women he meets-
I pray for them-
Sociopaths are SO likable- that's the hard part. They are SO GOOD at coming off as real people. But they are not.
You THINK you would know- but you don't. They are masterful at pretending to care.
They have absolutely ZERO consicience. NONE.
Would tell people they loved them, whatever they wanted to hear, but they truly felt nothing-
We had this one pedophile sociopath who was this young handsome young man, very handsome, smart... Also like this guy, incredibly handsome and charming- you would NEVER ever have guessed he liked to hurt 12 year olds-
& everyone THINKS they would know or sense- but I am highly intuitive- and sensitive- and I always thought that too- until them-
-------------------- There is no wealth but life. -John Ruskin
All truth goes through 3 stages: first it is ridiculed: then it is violently opposed: finally it is accepted as self evident. - Schopenhauer Posts: 5639 | From Aptos CA USA | Registered: Apr 2005
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CaliforniaLyme
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The reason I tihnk this article is valuable here btw is because the parents AND the man used the perception, the MEME, that Lyme is a VERY VERY SERIOUS DISEASE!!*)*!*)!!!!
Which is the meme we know to be true and the one we want the world to know- so in a weird way, that is positive for us as a whole, that perception which is reflected in the choices these sick people made.
-------------------- There is no wealth but life. -John Ruskin
All truth goes through 3 stages: first it is ridiculed: then it is violently opposed: finally it is accepted as self evident. - Schopenhauer Posts: 5639 | From Aptos CA USA | Registered: Apr 2005
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oxygenbabe
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In terms of her fiance, the transmission rate is practically "zero" if you use condoms...it sounds like after they got engaged, she "trusted" him.
So do you have to regard everybody as a potential sociopath?
Here in NY, there were 2 articles (one an editorial) in the NY Times on Sunday, about a doctor who re-used syringes to inject drugs into his patients, and spread Hep C and HIV. Though he initially cooperated in terms of some files he then hired a lawyer and the whole thing was delayed for 3 years as he staved off further investigation. Now the state finally sent out a letter notifying over 600 patients they need to get tested. Obviously the doc doesn't care; he cared more about his practice than patients' health, the only reason to re-use syringes is you're cheap and you're lazy. In addition NY State only decided to monitor him after "teaching" him about infection control.
What about Kanye West's mom--did she know her famous plastic surgeon had malpractice suits settled out of court?
So every person you meet, every doc you go to, you should be wary?
I'm on a bit of a rant here but I experienced it firsthand this year, in terms of salt/c, I learned a sobering lesson as per above--people can be sociopathic when there's something *they* think they need. If that person *needs* to believe they're getting well even while getting sick, and they are encouraging you to do it, they will omit all relevant information about all bad side effects. That's why I got on my high horse on the Marshall Thread.
And then something happened at one of the docs I go to. I'm one of the few patients who knows--and nothing I can do about it.
Intuition just won't cut it either. Now I try to be wary generally but that's not fun. Take the prep for colonoscopies--the phosphate solution can cause renal failure in a small number of cases. The propofol the docs like to use, if you go into respiratory distress, cannot be reversed. Yet they prescribe the phosphate solution widely--which means some folks every year will end up in acute renal failure or even dialysis (and it can take months to show up----so people might not even connect it back to the prep)...and some will have serious adverse effects because propofol usually works so well and nicely, and the docs love it--patient is out, they do their thing, patient recovers without being groggy.
Its easier for the docs.
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posted
It is horrible and it is obvious the poor man was in total denial, the article doesn't say whether he himself was being treated for AIDS.
Hard to imagine what the parents could've done. I suspect they thought it was up to him to reveal it or not.
Protecting their son at the expense of the poor woman's health is criminal on paper but what happens in real life is sometimes very different.
I suppose it is kind of similar to a catholic priest not feeling he should tell anyone what he is told during confession, and short of encouraging the person to reveal it themselves, he can do nothing, regardless of the impact on others.
When I read the title of the thread I thought it was someone who thought he had Lyme and was therefore not treated for AIDS and died.
This is another AIDS/Lyme story
A friend of mine had been suffering with AIDS for nearly 15 years, he was on therapy and he was doing fine. He was traveling around leading a perfectly normal life, he was a very talented hairdresser, he was French and lived in Australia.
A few years ago, he came to France on a visit, he came to our place here in Paris after having spent a week at his sister's in the South-West of France, where he had gone walking in the woods with his nieces picking mushrooms.
We had not seem him for a few years and we went out for a chinese meal during which I told him all about my struggle with Lyme.
He rang me the next day in total panic: he had just found 2 ticks embedded behind his knee.
He was on his way to the airport to return to Australia. I insisted he should take abx immediately.
I told him I would drive to the airport and give him abx for him to take before the 2 day trip to Australia, as I thought he should not wait one more minute without treatment, but he refused saying he would not take them without his AIDS doctor advice.
When he got to Australia, he did not get taken seriously re the possibility of TBDs and no matter what I said, he believed and trusted his doctors, he didn't take abx.
6 months later he died of what I suspect was a manifestation of untreated neuroborreliosis.
He lived through the very worst of the AIDS dreadful 80s and 90s and died in 2003 of Lyme.
Nelly
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CaliforniaLyme
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Nelly, doesn't sound like denial, sounds like sociopathy to me*)!*)!
I have had many friends with HIV+, gosh, lost a whole bunch in the first wave pre-AIDS drugs arrived. Was lucky enough to know AIDS activist Vito Russo, he taught me a lot about social activism... Some of the most wonderful people I have ever known including my friend Gary Reynolds who died at 25 who was such a nice guy- I spent my high school years in drag bars in LA, my favorite places- in the 80s- yup, I lost many friends-
and my first husbands best friend Jimmy, an African-Amercian PhD motorcycle guy*)! Super guY(*)!
But never met someone who wouldn't tell another person for YEARS unless they were sociopathic- this is more than just denial IMO-
Yup, tragic story- Best wishes, Sarah
-------------------- There is no wealth but life. -John Ruskin
All truth goes through 3 stages: first it is ridiculed: then it is violently opposed: finally it is accepted as self evident. - Schopenhauer Posts: 5639 | From Aptos CA USA | Registered: Apr 2005
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-------------------- The best index to a person's character is how he treats people who can't do him any good, and how he treats people who can't fight back. -Abigail van Buren (Pauline Esther Friedman) (1918-2002) Posts: 409 | From Florida | Registered: Dec 2005
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Vermont_Lymie
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What an incredibly sad story. How could that man knowingly infect someone that he is supposed to love, and who trusts him? Breaks my heart. Hopefully she can get good medical care and regain some of her health.
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-------------------- --Lymetutu-- Opinions, not medical advice! Posts: 96222 | From Texas | Registered: Feb 2001
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CaliforniaLyme
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Oxy- she was trying to GET PREGNANT by him!!! That's why no condoms!! (OUCH!!!_)
LT, a meme is QUOTE A meme is: An idea that, like a gene, can replicate and evolve. A unit of cultural information that represents a basic idea that can be transferred from one individual to another, and subjected to mutation, crossover and adaptation. UNQUOTE
So there's a meme of Being Blonde in our society. You know what that means without me writing "dumb as a doorknob". It has been encoded in you to know that, that idea that blonde=dumb, from old cartoon strips of Blondie and Dagwood to Anna Nicole Smith playing to her reality show to Jessica Whatshername and tuna of the sea=
The OLD Meme for Lyme would be, hands down,
"Easy to catch, easy to cure."
What we have been trying to do is get that changed and it looks, from this article, like it has changed- to
"Lyme is a serious disease not easily treated."
So that's good!!! It made sense to the fiance.
She didn't go, "What? Lyme? But Lyme is cured with 4 weeks of Doxy so I KNEW they were lying to me!"
She went, "Oh, poor honey, let me bathe his brow and make him good pasta and try furiously to have a baby with him, my poor sexy sick Lymie."
Poor, poor woman. Poor poor woman!!! And poor parents IF they didn't know- if they did know I think she ought to get everything they own-!!!
-------------------- There is no wealth but life. -John Ruskin
All truth goes through 3 stages: first it is ridiculed: then it is violently opposed: finally it is accepted as self evident. - Schopenhauer Posts: 5639 | From Aptos CA USA | Registered: Apr 2005
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treepatrol
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Man being treated for lyme dies of Aids
Isnt even in the artical I dont like sensationalism 8man12 That hook is a lie
-------------------- Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Remember Iam not a Doctor Just someone struggling like you with Tick Borne Diseases.
canbravelyme
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posted
Admittedly, I didn't read the entire article, but on this limited basis, I agree with Sarah.
I may go a step further: I think it could be construed as murder. There is so much covert hate toward women, I wonder if that wasn't an aspect of their relationship.
I mean, there has got to be a line, where we ARE our brother's keeper, right? So many "liberal" laws are in actuality callous laws, wrapped in liberal coating. Me not being Your Problem, is one of the things I find most appalling in our society.
It was her fianc�'s responsibility to inform her. He had a responsibility to rise above his ego and disclose no matter how he felt, if it was at the minimum that and not a covert act of aggression. I do think there should be legislation that protects one person from knowingly infecting another without consent. Maybe Lyme is not cut and dry on the sexual transmission side, but HIV is.
Eesh. It's like having a gun and shooting it. Egad.
-------------------- For medical advice related to Lyme disease, please see an ILADS physician. Posts: 1494 | From Getting there... | Registered: Aug 2006
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