Science / Medicine : Payoff in Contact Tracing

Contact tracing--the practice of notifying the sexual contacts of people with AIDS--is playing a growing role in national AIDS-control efforts. But there is little proof that it does more than fulfill the political needs of public officials, several researchers reported.

Edmund F. Dejowski, a psychologist and lawyer at Rutgers University, whose group is studying contact tracing for the New Jersey Department of Health, said reports of success from proliferating programs nationwide are contradictory, unscientific and possibly biased.

Dejowski said people may be being coerced into naming names, which would raise questions about whether such voluntary programs were truly voluntary. It also remains unclear whether such programs really accomplish their intended effect--reducing risky behavior.

Dejowski blamed “political agendas and personal moral philosophies” for the spread of contact tracing programs throughout the country, rather than any current scientific evidence that the approach works.