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HIV/AIDS Awareness Week is back Pierce hosts events to encourage prevention

JORDAN

WILLIAMS

Assistant Sports Editor @JWRoundup

The HIV/AIDS Awareness Week will return to Pierce College this month, after insurance and legal constraints forced its cancellation during the fall semester.

Each semester, Pierce hosts the week-long campaign as a way to improve public awareness about dangers of the disease and methods of prevention.

Events and highlights include guest speakers from Being Alive, an organization made up of HIV/ AIDS positive members and people affected by the disease, in addition to free and confidential HIV-testing provided by non-profit organization BIENESTAR and the AIDS Healthcare Foundation.

The tests were unavailable last semester because of a lastminute insurance issue. The risk management office at the Los Angeles Community College District required a letter of subrogation from the workers’ compensation provider for BIENESTAR.

A letter of subrogation is a legal document that would protect the district and Pierce if a worker were to sustain an injury while working.

For example, if a BIENESTAR worker contracted HIV while administering a test, the workers’ comp provider could not sue the LACCD or Pierce.

BIENESTAR’s provider made it clear that if they were forced to write the letter of subrogation, BIENESTAR would incur the costs. When faced with the costs of that coverage, BIENESTAR backed out of the event.

[See HIV/AIDS, pg. 4]