Carroll County Health Department is gauging interest in the creation of an AIDS quilt that would memorialize area residents who have lost their lives while suffering from the disease.

"We would like to know if there is a need here to remember those who have died from AIDS," said Lynda Niles, a county health educator who frequently lectures on disease prevention. "If there is, then Carroll County could have its own quilt."

For many years, families of acquired immune deficiency syndrome patients have contributed to the national AIDS quilt, an artifact so large that it is rarely displayed in its entirety.

Organizations can borrow eight-square panels of the quilt to display, as Niles did recently for a health fair for at-risk teen-agers.

Families interested in participating would have to design and create a square.

Information: 410-876-4958.

Guest speaker to discuss drug abuse, mental illness

The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill will provide a guest speaker for the monthly meeting of the Heroin Action Coalition of Carroll County at 7 p.m. Thursday in Room 003 at the County Office Building, 225 N. Center St., Westminster.

The alliance, which offers a family-to-family counseling service, will discuss substance abuse and its relation to mental illness.

Information: 410-374-1048.