PROTESTERS DEMAND FEDERAL FUNDS FOR AIDS FIGHT

SOME POLICE WEAR PLASTIC GLOVES TO MAKE 78 ARRESTS ACROSS FROM WHITE HOUSE

Angry AIDS-care officials and gay rights activists staged a sitdown protest yesterday on Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House, shouting "Shame, Shame, Shame" at its absent occupant, President Bush, and demanding that the federal government provide more funds for AIDS treatment and prevention.

The noon demonstration blocked traffic and resulted in 78 arrests. The protesters, many of them directors and board presidents of major AIDS organizations around the country, were charged with incommoding, in this case blocking the street, a misdemeanor.

The arrests and a rally earlier in Lafayette Park were held as part of World AIDS Day, so designated by the World Health Organization.

The message from nearly every speaker was that AIDS-care organizations are being stretched to the breaking point by the deadly virus -- and need help.

"We have a national disaster unfolding ever more rapidly before our eyes," said Tim Sweeney, deputy executive director of New York City's Gay Men's Health Crisis. "To waste time costs lives."

Sweeney said 30 people are found each day in his state to have the AIDS virus. New York, he said, has had 25,000 AIDS cases in the last seven years and expects that figure to climb to 50,000 by 1992.

During the arrests, more than 200 other demonstrators shouted support from the sidewalk along Pennsylvania Avenue, which was closed by police between 15th and 17th streets.

Protesters carried banners and signs, including those lamenting the more than 61,000 AIDS-related deaths since the epidemic began.

Some demonstrators kissed; others snake danced. Most sat down on the pavement and shouted a variety of angry and humorous chants: "Bush Open Your Eyes and See, It's a State of Emergency." "We're Here, We're Queer, We're Not Touring the White House." When some police officers donned plastic white gloves to make arrests, the protesters taunted, "They'll See You on the News, Your Gloves Don't Match Your Shoes."

Jean McGuire, executive director of the District-based AIDS Action Council, gave Bush, who had flown to Malta for a U.S.-Soviet summit, F's for his administration's performance in the area of AIDS prevention, access to care, including affordable drug therapies, and funding for AIDS research and services.

She said the nation's elected leaders and others "continue to be bogged down with homophobia" instead of taking action on a virus that threatens the lives of millions of men, women and children.

Pat Christen, executive director of the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, said the number of AIDS cases in San Francisco has jumped 400 percent in three years, with the private sector bearing 80 percent of the health care costs.

"Our community has given and given and given again," she said. "My city is reeling."

Phil Morrow, who has AIDS and is board of directors president for AIDS Services of Dallas, called complacency "just the booster shot the AIDS virus needed to accelerate."

Morrow, 35, said government inaction has stifled health care services "right down to the county hospital level."

Articles appear as they were originally printed in The Washington Post and may not include subsequent corrections.