Baltimore Alternative, March 1992

March 1992 ▼ Volume 7, Number 3 ▼ Serving The Baltimore /Washington Community Since 1986 The chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff supports the military ban on gays and les¬ bians for fear they would find hetero¬ sexual soldiers “sexually attractive” and thereby distress them. Closeted homosexuals are not a problem, said the U.S. senior military commander. General Colin Powell, but open gays might undermine “order and discipline.” Powell’s remarks came February 5 during a House of Representatives Budget Committee hearing, under questioning from gay U.S. Rep. Barney Frank, (D-MA). “[The gay ban] is not a security argument, and it is not an argument of performance on the part of homo¬ sexuals who might be in uniform, and it is not saying they are not good enough,” Powell said. “It is just my judgment and the judgment of the chiefs that homosexual behavior is inconsistent with maintaining good order and discipline.” “What do I mean by that?” Powell asked. “I mean it is difficult in a mili¬ tary setting where there is no privacy, where you don’t get a choice of asso¬ ciation, where you don’t get a choice of where you live, to introduce a group of individuals who are proud, brave, loyal, good Americans, but who favor a homosexual lifestyle, and put them in with heterosexuals who would prefer not to have some¬ body of the same sex find them sexu¬ ally attractive, put them in close proximity, ask them to share the most private facilities together, the bed¬ room, the barracks, latrines, the showers. I think that is a very diffi¬ cult problem to give the military. I think it would be prejudicial to good order and discipline to try to integrate that in the current military structure.” See GAYS IN MILITARY page 2 On my honor. . . Boy Scout Leader Says Gays Have No Place in Scouting ATHENS, Greece (AP) — The secretary general of the World Organization of the Scout Movement said homosexuals have no place in scouting. “Scouting actively discourages homosexuals from joining its ranks. Nobody is obliged to be a scout," Jacques Moreillon said. “We don't pronounce ourselves on the pros and cons of homosexuality outside scouting, but we strongly believe that our scout youth should not be a hunting ground for homosexuals," he added. The role of gays in the youth organization has become an issue in the United States, where the Boy Scouts of America is facing increased pres¬ sure to admit gays from its primary funding source and some local troops. The United Way of the Bay Area based in San Francisco, Calif, has asked the See LOOKING BACK page 2 ddC to be Given Away to Thousands FDA, Drug Company, Activists Agree on Broad Access BY GAREY LAMBERT THE ALTERNATIVE n a potentially precedent-setting agreement between the FDA. ddC manufacturer Hoffmann-LaRoche and AIDS activists, ddC will be made available to the thou¬ sands of People With AIDS who have been getting the drug through underground sources. Under the program, which will operate while the FDA con¬ siders the application for approval of the drug, ddC will be provided free. Hoffmann-LaRoche and the FDA announced the program in simultaneous press releases on February 20. Roche officials said they expect to have the program in place and operating by March 5. (For details of the program, see AIDS Update.) The announcement came after weeks of negotiations and controversy about ddC and the underground availability of the drug. In late January, FDA agents entered buyers’ clubs in Los Angeles, Fort Lauderdale, FL and other cities and took sam¬ ples of the underground ddC being sold. On February 10, Dr. Randolph Wykoff, the FDA’s Director of AIDS Coordination, sent a letter to the clubs which "strong¬ ly” urged them to "ceases distribution of this product.” According to the letter, FDA analysts found wide variations in the amount of drug in the underground products. In part, the letter said, “[FDA] analyzed 30 individual capsules and found that the content of ddC varied from a low of zero percent (i.e. the capsule contained no ddC) to high of 230 percent of the expected content (i.e. the capsule contained over twice the labelled amount of ddC.)" Though the letter did not overtly threaten the clubs with enforcement action if its recommendations were not followed, many buyers' clubs and activist organizations reacted with alarm, and most stopped selling the drug. In Washington, the DC Buyers Club, which has been selling underground ddC, mailed copied of the FDA letter to its clients with a cover letter which said in part. '•The DC Buyers Club has been directed by the FDA to cease all sales of the underground drug known as ddC. We will comply with this directive.” As recently as February 27, a buyers’ club in Fort Lauderdale reported that the U.S. Customs Service, apparently acting on behalf of the FDA, confiscated a shipment of under¬ ground ddC bound from Amsterdam to Florida. At The Alternative's deadline, February 29, the seized shipment had been freed. “If nothing else has been gained, at least the drug will be available for people,” said AIDS Action Baltimore’s Lynda See ddC page 5