Abstract

KIE: The authors provide an overview of ethical issues that arise in patient care and clinical research related to acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). They focus on the issue of risk to health personnel caring for AIDS patients--which they consider to be negligible, the importance of protecting patient confidentiality, the ethics of controlled clinical trials for AIDS therapies, the apportionment of costs for experimental therapies, the physician's responsibility vis-à-vis nonapproved or illicitly obtained therapies, and the importance of giving AIDS patients equal access to high quality care.