Copyright 1999 Chicago Sun-Times, Inc.
Chicago
Sun-Times
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April 7, 1999, WEDNESDAY, Late
Sports Final Edition
SECTION: EDITORIAL; Pg. 33
LENGTH: 156 words
HEADLINE:
Laws are not cure-alls
BYLINE: Editorials
BODY:
The Illinois House has passed and moved to
the Senate a bill that would require public hospitals and clinics to use safer
needles and syringes to reduce the risk of staff members being infected with
AIDS, hepatitis and other viruses from accidental needle
sticks.
The Illinois Hospital and Health Systems Association
opposes the legislation and says government should leave it to hospitals and
clinics to solve the problem themselves. We agree. The number of such accidents
has been declining, and many hospitals already are studying whether to switch to
some 250 new products now available, with more to come, to reduce further the
risk.
This decline, the hospital association asserts, is "not the result
of regulation, but of practical common sense measures introduced by health care
practitioners and manufacturers."
That makes more sense to us than
having inexpert lawmakers making the rules for medical professionals.
LOAD-DATE: April 7, 1999 
