Mandatory in utero testing is a terrible idea.

First, tests have shown that most children seroconvert to negative if they are tested and treated at birth and the mother does not reinfect them by breastfeeding. So it is not necessary to treat a child in utero, though it is slightly more optimal than treating them at birth. It's also not clear how AZT affects fetal development.

Second, if the general right of women to medical privacy isn't compelling to you, then how does efficacy strike you? Tests done at Grady Hospital in Atlanta indicated that women who met certain standards for potential HIV infection and were counseled tended to voluntarily agree to be tested. Meanwhile, the most at-risk women are also those who are least likely to get prenatal care -- so this bill doesn't affect them.

So, to summarize, the net effect of the bill is this: it costs the taxpayers a great deal of money to test those who are largely not at risk in order to provide unnecessary treatment to children who are likely to seroconvert anyway. To make a meaningful change in the number of HIV+ fetuses who will become HIV+ 2 year-olds, we would be better served to simply introduce comprehensive HIV counseling programs coupled with programs designed to extend prenatal care to those who do not currently receive it.

First, the article is completely correct that we expect Keith Richards to act like the rock star he is. So it's a little disingenuous that now they're shocked -- shocked! -- by his behavior.

Second, while I wouldn't snort the ashes of a loved one, I hardly noticed this little incident until it spread like wildfire. Because depravity is relative. Keith's dad is dead. His ashes were entrusted to his son, who chose to take them into his own body. How's that more objectionable than, say, having his dad's ashes molded into a figurine, scattering them in any number of places, or simply throwing them out? All of these are completely legal because once a body is dead and made non-volatile it's simply an item to be handled by those for whom it was intended or who are compelled to do so for legal reasons.

And finally, no one's compelled to mourn the way you'd like them to.

I'm amazed by this because on my campus we have plans in place for such things. Did Va Tech not have such plans, or did they not invoke them?

I also don't appreciate being called a rube for not being blase about this tragedy. Particularly since, even though there are shootings on campuses, any individual campus has them rarely if ever. I can't recall one here, on the campus of a university about the same size -- and certainly not one in which the shooter breached existing security to hunt an individual down.

Finally, how hard is it to take logical steps to ensure the safety of your students on those rare occasions when it's warranted? Apparently too hard for Va Tech.

I have read a variety of letters claiming that we cannot judge the VT police for not warning students, locking down campus, or attempting to evacuate students because VT's a big place, the cops had no reason to suspect that their perpetrator was a danger, etc. But let's consider:

1. Someone who has killed more than one person has already diplayed a propensity to kill in general. This means that such a person represents a general danger.

2. Not having secured the suspect, the police were certainly to blame for assuming that he had fled the campus. People don't generally hide in places they're not familiar with, and a student from another country would have been most familar with his school's campus.

3. Failing to inform the remainder of campus of the incident -- and that a suspect remained at large -- is reprehensible, period. Because with either of those pieces of information, in the absence of any other action, the students and faculty would have been in a better position to protect themselves. Note that the shooter poked his head into the German class multiple times before he shot and imagine how different that situation might have been if class didn't meet that day, or if the students knew that a suspect matching his description was at their door.

Finally, I work at a university which is a bit bigger than VT. We have university-wide listservs, we have representatives who are contacted by telephone, and we have the usual public service announcements via radio. We invoke these resources to deal with tornados, floods, hurricanes, bomb threats, and snow. In fact, I was evacuated from my office two years ago on minutes of notice for a storm. It's not impossible. Furthermore, these types of events are rare -- but failing to respond to them aggressively can have dire consequences. Is it too much to ask that a university take all the steps that it can to ensure the safety of those who are there?

"At first, the shootings seemed like the sort of thing police around the country are called to every day. A domestic dispute in a dorm room, something that could happen on a big college campus without every student feeling touched by it. Certainly not the beginning of the worst shooting rampage in modern U.S. history."

Oh, yeah? Funny -- we haven't had a single one. Not one in the history of the country's oldest land grant institution. Nor am I aware of any at any of the larger schools in this state.

And if these sorts of things are so common, then why do tragedies like the murder in Penn State's Old Main stand out to us? Because they aren't.

VT dropped the ball, period. And there's no need to lie about the general safety records of college campuses in an effort to defend them.

Good stuff, Heather.