The HIV Legal Check-up is a diagnostic legal needs assessment for people living with HIV infection, developed by HALSA (HIV/AIDS Legal Services Alliance) and the Young Lawyers Division of the ABA (of which I am a member for one more year!) Its purpose is to assess legal needs, educate, and make appropriate referrals for services.
Under other circumstances, a client would complete a screening questionnaire and then meet with an attorney to discuss the issues that arise from the client's particular circumstances. The attorney would be available to answer questions, dig a little deeper to identify hidden issues, and make a referral to a service provider.
I am going to attempt to implement the Check-Up on the internet, between this blog and my website gabbardlaw.org. The blog portion will be mostly interactive: I will post about various topics and invite comments from you all. The website will contain mostly resources and materials for reference. Your feedback will affect the content both on the site and on this blog. Tell me what you want to know about!
The Topics
The HIV Legal Check-Up as it was designed looks to the following areas of law:
- Privacy and Confidentiality
- Discrimination
- Housing
- Immigration
- Family Law
- Insurance
- Public Benefits
- Debtor/Creditor issues
Since I have AIDS myself, I know that this list is not comprehensive. There are some practicalities that I want to address, such as:
- Understanding disability and AIDS
- Dealing with your primary healthcare provider
- Dealing with AIDS service organizations
- AIDS and self-advocacy
- "Retirement" planning for people with AIDS
And the list is still not complete. This is where you come in, gentle reader. What would you like to discuss? The only limitation I will impose is that the topic be HIV/AIDS-related.
I would also like to invite you to visit my website. On the AIDS Law Project page, there is a link to the ABA's Directory of Legal Resources for People with AIDS. The last page of the document is a form to add services to the directory. If you know of something that is not listed, let them know.
I have set up an RSS for this blog, if you would like to subscribe. The next post will be on privacy and confidentiality (unless something else tickles my fancy first). Until then,
JR
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