The concept of contact tracing and notification once used for sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) is being mentioned for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS). Some professional organizations have supported contact notification; others have opposed it. Initially, states were free to establish their own contact notification programs. More recently, some federally-available AIDS counseling funds require the establishment of contact notification efforts. Consequently, by July 1988, all states encouraged seropositive persons to notify partners. One particularly troublesome trend is the emergence of what might be called "private" contact notification in which an individual with knowledge of the serostatus of another, takes it upon himself to notify a third person of that serostatus. The Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome Research and Information Act amendment introduced in April 1988 would deny AIDS research, information, and prevention funds to any state or locality that forbids licensed health care providers from notifying the spouse of a human immune virus-positive person of their potential exposure if the provider believes the infected person will not inform the spouse. AIDS prevention requires reducing high risk behavior. Health promotion and disease prevention stand in contrast to contact tracing. Amendments to federal legislation limiting health promotion efforts targeted to homosexual men are a part of public policy. The experience thus far suggests that political agendas and personal moral philosophies of policy makers have had more to do with the development of AIDS prevention policy than has science. (ABL)