There was a moment a quarter-century back when it seemed logical that if a student were HIV-positive, his principal ought to know so that principal could tell the nurse, the teacher, maybe the coach. We were in a moment of panic over this new and incurable illness, we didn’t know for sure how HIV was transmitted, and we all wanted to protect our kids as best we could.
That moment of fear and ignorance passed well over 20 years ago, but the Illinois law that mandated reporting from local or state health departments to schools remained in place until just now.
The champion, over the course of five years, of repealing that law was our own state Rep. LaShawn Ford. Finally, in this do-nothing year in the state legislature, Ford pushed the change through both houses and on to Gov. Pat Quinn, who signed it last week.
Thanks are deserved and offered.
