TOPEKA, Kansas (AP) — The American Civil Liberties Union and the leading gay rights group in Kansas worry that state legislators are moving toward ending the legal protections that prohibit AIDS and HIV patients from being quarantined.

State officials said Monday that those fears are unfounded.

House and Senate negotiators are working on the final version of a bill meant to help emergency personnel who deal with people who may have infectious diseases.

It would allow the Department of Health and Environment to set statewide rules for disclosing information about a person’s medical condition to emergency workers and to make it easier for those workers to get tested for diseases.

But the measure also would repeal a 25-year-old law saying people with AIDS or the virus that causes it can’t be quarantined.