AIDS panel pick has called illness 'gay plague'

[normalnoises]

AIDS panel pick has called illness 'gay plague'

By Ceci Connolly, Washington Post, 1/23/2003

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration has chosen Jerry Thacker, a Pennsylvania marketing consultant who has characterized AIDS as the ''gay plague,'' to serve on the Presidential Advisory Commission on HIV and AIDS.

Next week, Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson is scheduled to swear in several new commission members, including Thacker, a former Bob Jones University employee, who says he contracted the AIDS virus after his wife was infected through a blood transfusion.

The 35-member commission, which makes recommendations to the White House on AIDS prevention, is the latest incarnation of a panel that has existed in various forms since the Reagan administration.

Earlier commissions issued reports strongly critical of the national response to the AIDS crisis, helping to nudge the government and the pharmaceutical industry toward greater action.

In his speeches and writings on his Web site and elsewhere, Thacker has described homosexuality as a ''deathstyle'' rather than a lifestyle and asserted that ''Christ can rescue the homosexual.''

Carl Schmid, a Republican gay activist who worked on President Bush's 2000 campaign, said he was disappointed and frustrated that Health and Human Services disregarded warnings that Thacker's selection would overshadow the work of the commission.

''We need to have a scientific-based approach to the problems of HIV-AIDS and not this radical agenda he's pushing,'' said Schmid.

This story ran on page A7 of the Boston Globe on 1/23/2003.

© Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company.

[normalnoises]

Alright, "Christ can rescue the homosexual"...now we need someone to rescue the ignorant.

I find Thacker's quotes to be very disturbing.

In his book titled, "When AIDS Comes Home", he tells the story of how His book, "When AIDS Comes Home," is the story of how he and his family have dealt with HIV/AIDS as a result of a blood transfusion given to his wife in 1984. Jerry, his wife Sue, and their daughter Sarah are all infected with the virus (see http://www.scepter.org).

http://www.rightideas.us/about.asp?flag=jerry

[nifer]

this guys on the presidential advisory commission? wat the hell were they thinking

[normalnoises]

Thacker withdrew under fire:

http://boston.com/dailyglobe2/024/nation/Bush_AIDS_panel_pick_withdraws+.shtml