00:00:00 In 1985, we said with reasonable self-assurance, HIV is not transmitted by casual means.

00:00:16 As the years have gone on, we now increasingly know it is not transmitted in the workplace, on buses, in social settings, in theaters or restaurants.

00:00:27 We now can move on to the much more important issues of how we're going to deal with HIV in the workplace regarding working, disability, and all those other employer-employee related aspects.

00:00:48 HIV disease is a much more logical name for this than AIDS. We have to remember that AIDS was named back before we knew what caused the disease.

00:01:00 Now we have a virus, it's called HIV. There are a whole spectrum of symptoms that that virus causes, so we call it HIV disease.

00:01:11 AIDS is Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome. It is actually the name for the very last phases of HIV infection, when people get very specific, severe infections and malignancies.

00:01:28 In the 1980s, we learned that education is the best means to prevent the transmission of HIV disease and to alleviate fear of contracting it during normal workplace activities.

00:01:39 The next step is for business to include HIV as part of their chronic illness policies and to provide confidentiality, privacy, and reasonable accommodation, as well as ensure appropriate benefit coverage for these workers.

00:01:53 HIV is a chronic disease, and I think it is analogous to a lot of other chronic diseases in which people can work for long periods of time, even though their lifespan may be shorter than other people in the population.

00:02:08 There have been a number of cases throughout the states that pretty much resolve the issue that AIDS and AIDS-related diseases are considered a handicap that is to be protected under both federal and state law.

00:02:25 It's important to have an AIDS policy because people are still afraid, and because people need information, they need to have that information reinforced, and people need to know up front, ahead of time, before a crisis occurs. This is how we treat people who have this problem.

00:02:50 Syntex makes prescription medicines with facilities throughout the world. In 1986, senior management developed a policy that considers AIDS to be like any other life-threatening disease. Syntex also set out to educate its employees about the disease and its human resources staff on how to respond when an employee is diagnosed.

00:03:13 The policy we developed was a thoughtful policy based on the best advice that we could get from national organizations. Therefore, it was a policy that was carefully thought out and worked through, and we did not experience any kickback from various parts of the country about the basic policy.

00:03:32 Syntex quickly had the opportunity to put their policy to the test. After a number of prolonged absences, one of their employees came forward and told health services that he had HIV disease.

00:03:44 The company had put out a newsletter, I think in March, a big, big, big one that folded out about HIV. It was to all employees, and it was talking about what it was, how you got it, how you didn't get it, and it very firmly stated in that newsletter that the Syntex policy was that anybody who had HIV would be allowed to continue working.

00:04:05 I knew that we had a clear mandate from upper management that this employee was going to be accommodated, so I could do my job with confidence, and I could communicate policies to him with confidence that we would make every effort to accommodate him, that his medical information would be kept confidential, that he didn't have to tell anybody if he didn't want to.

00:04:26 Katie sought advice from the company's Human Resources Council and discussed the case without revealing the employee's name. They recognized that Stephen's supervisors had not been educated about how to implement the policy, so a training session was scheduled.

00:04:42 We had managed to put together a fairly sophisticated training program for all our HR people in terms of how to train managers to deal with AIDS, in terms of the legal issues, the HR issues, the sensitivity issues, the confidentiality issues. The training of managers hadn't started, and then out of the blue, we find out that we've got somebody knocking on our door saying, I've got a problem.

00:05:05 When we went to the seminar, I learned the difference between HIV positive, between ARC, between AIDS, very important information to me. I also learned both the legal position and syntax position regarding the confidentiality of information for an employee and the handicapped feature of what we needed to look at in dealing with this employee.

00:05:33 Katie evaluated Stephen's work capability with his physician and shared it with Barbara so she could develop an accommodation plan, even though she was still unaware of Stephen's disease.

00:05:44 HIV disease is a very difficult disease to accommodate in many ways. You have frequent episodic illnesses that are very unpredictable, and it really is, I see it as the highest standard of accommodation that you can make, or one of the very highest standards that you can make.

00:06:00 The manager herself came up with the accommodation that we ultimately applied, which was a redistribution of the workload among the balance of the department, with the sick individual being, in effect, a floater who picked up the excess from everybody else when he was there to do it, and it worked very well.

00:06:22 Stephen eventually told Barbara he had HIV disease, which made it easier for her to understand his special needs.

00:06:30 I felt like we did the right thing, and I felt like our attitudes were right, our actions were in good faith, and it's always a learning and growing experience when you go through that, so I think I probably am better able to deal with any kind of illness than I ever was before.

00:06:56 Stephen was the test case for Syntex's policy. It works. It is being used with HIV disease and all other cases of catastrophic illness.

00:07:05 For me, and for other people, having the confidentiality and having the benefits gives a person more control over their life, and being ill is enough of an out-of-control kind of issue without having other things in your life be taken over by some other force.

00:07:23 Carla worked for three years as a bookkeeper for a publishing company, where she was an excellent employee, but she resigned when her attendance became an issue because the company did not know how to deal with her HIV disease.

00:07:36 If you have an employee that's sick, that cannot do a lot of the work, that has a lot of sick days, has taken all their vacation days because they were sick, it's not really looked upon as a moneymaker.

00:07:50 If an employee becomes ill, if an employee has a chronic illness, are we going to scuttle that employee, or are we going to try to retain that person?

00:08:00 That's the critical issue, and I would suggest that just from a business sense, it makes much more sense to retain a trained employee.

00:08:11 Carla was not only denied reasonable accommodation in her job, but her confidentiality was compromised by her employer.

00:08:18 I think people need to know that people with AIDS are just like anybody else, that we don't like our business spread throughout the office, and our personal lives are personal, and who I choose to tell is who I choose to tell.

00:08:37 An employee, like any other individual, has a basic right under many laws, including the U.S. Constitution, to have the right to be left alone, essentially, which is your right to privacy.

00:08:54 Carla has good and bad days, periods where she could work and others where she is too sick to think about a job.

00:09:02 She's living on disability and is very unhappy about the way she had to leave her co-workers and her company.

00:09:07 I felt that my employer did not respect my wishes as far as confidentiality, and that that was a minus, that I did not get any accommodation, that I didn't get a farewell party or a farewell bonus when I did leave.

00:09:28 Something that said, look, you're a valuable person, we're going to miss you, you did a good job, have a good life.

00:09:41 Wade Smith works for Digital Equipment Corporation, a company of 130,000 employees worldwide.

00:09:47 He has AIDS.

00:09:48 When Wade became ill, he was working in a fabrication unit, where attendance is critical to both the project and continued employment.

00:09:57 Wade did not know about Digital's AIDS policy and was afraid he'd lose his job.

00:10:02 He confided in a co-worker and in one of his supervisors, who told him indeed his job and benefits were secure.

00:10:08 Wade also obtained additional information from the company's AIDS programs office, which is part of worldwide corporate employee relations.

00:10:16 If I took the chance of telling them, would the policy stand behind me or would I lose my job?

00:10:23 If I didn't tell them, my absenteeism was going to assuredly make me lose my job.

00:10:30 By listening to some of his fears and frankly maybe some doubts and some insecurities, I was able to talk specifically about our company philosophy,

00:10:45 which is that employees who have HIV infection are entitled to the same benefits and opportunities and treatment as anybody who has any long-term debilitating illness.

00:10:56 The biggest reason why I came forward as far as HIV positive was because I was informed that you would not be dismissed from your job because of your condition.

00:11:08 Wade was not Digital's first HIV case.

00:11:12 The company developed specific guidelines for managing HIV.

00:11:16 Policies for confidentiality, fitness for duty, and reasonable accommodation were in place, as well as an education program.

00:11:24 Digital also provides seminars for supervisors on how to manage all forms of chronic illness.

00:11:31 We established an AIDS program office to begin to define the policy, get it clear, and begin to define a strategy for Digital that would get us very clear about how we would approach AIDS training in the company.

00:11:47 I know what makes the difference for Wade and other employees living with HIV infection is the consistency that when they talk to a personnel manager, their own manager, or their supervisor, or for me long distance, that they get the same message.

00:12:04 Once Wade understood Digital's HIV policy, he requested an accommodation to a less stressful job.

00:12:10 And he decided to share his HIV status with certain human resources and health services managers.

00:12:16 This was his choice since Digital's policy on confidentiality only required that he had a documented medical condition.

00:12:23 I now had a situation that I had never come across before professionally that I had to come to grips with how I felt.

00:12:31 Then I had to think about how do I act responsive to my corporation, what kind of plan do I make, who do I talk to about it, how do I handle the confidentiality.

00:12:40 From the very beginning, Digital has been 100% behind me, in front of me, looking at aspects of where my health could lead me that I haven't been looked at, and has sat down and discussed it with me.

00:12:59 The people in Wade's confidence, and others who only knew that a medical condition existed, worked together to find a more suitable job for him.

00:13:08 Once his fitness to work was evaluated, a reasonable alternative was found.

00:13:13 The most important thing for Wade in terms of the job selection was that he would have some choice.

00:13:18 Wade has a lot of pride in what he does, and he wanted to feel as though he was still making a very active contribution to the success of the program that we were involved in.

00:13:27 He was very motivated and very concerned. I think he looked at the company and its success as something that was really part of him.

00:13:36 I think it was a wonderful change for him. Wade, who was a dynamo, had something to strive for now, had something to think about, something to really put his energies behind.

00:13:46 Wade wanted to make a difference in the time that he had left, and he was working second shift or off shift, and he wanted to make sure that he wasn't forgotten, and that he could make a contribution.

00:14:00 Wade's been promoted to a job with flexible hours that takes advantage of his production skills.

00:14:05 He's making a contribution to digital, and is showing that AIDS is having little effect on his job performance.

00:14:12 It's important for me to do my job well, because there are people that are going to come up from behind me with AIDS,

00:14:21 and I have to set an example, not only for myself as a human being to hold myself up and not give in to self-pity and crying and anger, but to set an example that we are useful people.

00:14:42 Modine Manufacturing Company is headquartered in Racine, Wisconsin, a city of 80,000.

00:14:49 The company makes heat transfer products primarily for the automotive industry.

00:14:53 They have 4,500 employees working at 15 manufacturing sites located in small towns in central and southern states.

00:15:02 Modine has developed a mandatory education program for all its employees, and policies to cover HIV like any catastrophic illness.

00:15:11 Although they are a conservative company with no reported HIV cases, Modine realizes that this proactive stance makes good business sense.

00:15:20 The driving force behind their program is the company's personnel director, John McNulty, with support from senior management.

00:15:28 Well, from the standpoint of the policies, the first thing that we did was to find out as much as we could about AIDS.

00:15:35 We also checked out with our insurance company to find out what would be covered and how we could best handle those situations.

00:15:43 And as a result of that, we decided that we would cover AIDS just as any other catastrophic illness.

00:15:51 Once we got the policy down, once it said what we were going to do, the rest was very simple.

00:15:56 Then we just went out and told our people, this is what AIDS is, this is how you get it, this is how you prevent it,

00:16:02 and this is what the company will do if you get in the jam. Very simple after that.

00:16:07 McNulty, along with the company's medical director and labor relations director, went to the San Francisco AIDS Foundation

00:16:14 to learn about the disease and how to set up an education program.

00:16:18 They returned to develop their own program, which includes information on reasonable accommodation and confidentiality

00:16:24 that has been presented to all of their employees.

00:16:27 What we did is that we initially got together with the unions prior to the time we went in and made a presentation

00:16:34 and sat down with them and explained to them what the program was and what we intended to do.

00:16:38 The way AIDS is spreading, there's a good chance we will have people working here that might be infected

00:16:45 and they have to handle them some way, and I think they're just starting early.

00:16:49 I think they told us that should something like this come up, it would be kept confidential,

00:16:57 that we would have our jobs as long as we were able to work,

00:17:03 and that medically they would take care of us through the insurance.

00:17:09 The essence of what we're trying to do is that irrespective of the fact that you've got a problem,

00:17:16 we're here to treat you with respect and dignity until such time as you can no longer be able to work,

00:17:23 and then the company continues its support in terms of payment of bills, payment of salaries, until you no longer need them.

00:17:34 Modine has shared their education program with other companies in the Midwest

00:17:38 and provided them with a model for policy and procedures for managing HIV cases.

00:17:43 John McNulty and Modine's other trainers have also been invited to speak about HIV disease at a variety of community organizations.

00:17:51 Most of our plants are in very small communities, rural areas,

00:17:56 and while we may not be the most significant leader in that community,

00:18:01 we are one of the leaders from an employment standpoint,

00:18:05 and we feel it's an obligation that the company has to educate those communities where we can provide a service.

00:18:14 John McNulty and Modine know that it's just a matter of time before HIV disease appears in one of their facilities,

00:18:21 but they have developed an education program that will explain the disease

00:18:25 and set major policy on how to treat any of their employees who become ill.

00:18:32 Modine, Syntex, and Digital have developed quick response teams for handling life-threatening illnesses.

00:18:38 These teams provide counseling and community outreach programs for employees, their families, and co-workers.

00:18:45 They also deal with grief, loss, and bereavement in the workplace.

00:18:50 Wade Smith died while he was employed at Digital.

00:18:53 It came as a great shock to his co-workers.

00:18:56 Digital responded by providing grief counseling, first for his immediate circle of co-workers, and then the plant as a whole.

00:19:03 He was just taken from us too fast.

00:19:06 You know, we just weren't prepared for it.

00:19:09 Taking down of the name tag on the office and so on is part of what makes a death real.

00:19:14 Right.

00:19:15 And it's the beginning to move on, but those are just as shocking events as the actual death itself.

00:19:21 And it sort of pierces your heart.

00:19:23 I cared a great deal because I thought Digital realizes Wade was a person and that there were people around him.

00:19:30 And it's the first time in my history, you know, of working that I've seen this happen.

00:19:36 At the beginning, people were saddened and depressed, and that really takes its toll in terms of working.

00:19:44 When you're depressed, your energy is constricted and so on.

00:19:48 Over the period of three or four days, when people were able to facilitate and process through these feelings, their energy was more released.

00:19:55 And I noticed with many of the people, for instance, they had statements like, well, I've got to get back to work now.

00:20:00 It was as if they could now go back to work with the kind of good feeling and good energy that they would normally put into their work.

00:20:07 Allen also found that he had to talk about how HIV is contracted and that working around Wade did not put any of them at risk.

00:20:15 Part of the grieving process is probably to do some reinforcement about the basic, basic educational facts.

00:20:22 You know, geez, I really was working with someone who was ill. He's now died. Am I going to get it?

00:20:27 Do I have to really begin worrying about telephones and desktops?

00:20:31 So part of our work is to do what I would call quick and dirty reinforcement of the basic facts.

00:20:37 In the 90s, businesses will still need to educate their employees that HIV cannot be transmitted during normal workplace activities.

00:20:45 It is only contracted from unsafe sexual practices, injected drug use, and prenatal transmission.

00:20:51 But the next step for HIV in the 90s will be much more.

00:20:56 The drug therapies that have developed over the last few years are prolonging life,

00:21:03 are prolonging the interval between infections and problems that take people away from the workplace.

00:21:12 Absenteeism will be less of a problem. Productivity will be greater. Sense of well-being.

00:21:19 Hope, anticipation of living longer, allows people to be more productive human beings and will make them better at their jobs.

00:21:27 People are corporations' greatest asset, and people with HIV are working longer.

00:21:32 Senior managers need to provide appropriate benefits, as well as policies for reasonable accommodation and confidentiality

00:21:39 that can be implemented with minimal workplace disruption.

00:21:43 It's important for a company that has developed an AIDS policy not to sit back and think that their job is finished,

00:21:51 because you must go back and look at that policy very, very often to be sure that new developments

00:21:59 have not changed what that policy needs to say and how it needs to be implemented.

00:22:05 American business needs policies that create an environment which will allow people with HIV disease to work with dignity,

00:22:12 work with job security, and work with a compassion and understanding of those around them.

00:22:17 I think I will be missed by some of the most fantastic people I have ever met in my life, my teachers,

00:22:37 and that they have allowed me to teach them.

00:22:40 And that I will probably, I know that I will miss them more, because life for them has to go on.

00:22:48 But I have learned a lot from these people.

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