The BEST of Lifelube - "When Barebacking is Noble: The Ongoing Controversy around Serosorting" From Friday, April 6, 2007

Before you get to the article, a note on language. At the LGBTI Health Summit in Philly last month, I learned a great new term called "sero-adaptation" which was coined by this very cool, edgy Parisian HIV prevention group called The Warning"

Sero-adaptation includes, but is not limited to, the idea of "sero-sorting." It refers to a selection of harm reduction strategies that do not involve the use of condoms. These strategies may reduce the risk of HIV transmission, but are not a guarantee and require a clear-headed risk analysis, weighing the good, the bad and the ugly and making a decision around the amount of risk you and your partners are comfortable with.

So, what are some examples of sero-adaptation?

Sero-sorting - having condom-free sex with guys who share the same HIV status

Strategic positioning - determining who does what based on HIV status. For instance, the neg guys fucks the poz guy, which is less risky than the other way around.

Dipping - just sticking the dick inside a little bit and for a brief amount of time

Pulling out - kinda like the "rhythm method" of the 50"s, meaning withdrawal before cumming. Lot's of people become parents like this, and this is exactly how I myself tested poz, but it is less risky than actually allowing cum inside.

Lube - using a generous amount of the slippery stuff reduces friciton in one's tender, delicate anus/rectum and therby reduces the risk of HIV being offered a pathway in.

And of course, there are other sexual activities that can be done by people with same or different HIV statuses that do not involve fucking - sucking, rimming, water sports, JO, fisting, massage...

By the way, just for a moment of clarity, none of the above can be taken to offer complete or partial protection from other types of sexual transmitted infections...

--Jim

So here is that article already..

"When Barebacking is Noble..."

By Christopher Murray

[From the current issue of Circuit Noize, with thanks to the Gay Men's Health Listserv for posting...]

Last month, a virtual Vesuvius erupted when the popular New York gossip blog,Gawker , posted a link and then the next day an interview with a twenty-something gay guy in Manhattan who gets off on fucking guys without condoms.Confessions of a Bareback Top, his site, details his unapologetic adventures and is whack off material for some guys and proof of the end of civilization for others. The kink with the blogger, and those who identify with him, is the thrill we get when we break the taboo of safer sex.

The undeniable point of Mr. Bareback Top, is that while many gay men mouth lip service to safer sex practices, when push comes to shoving it in, so to speak, it's a different story. The bareback top loudly proclaims both his negative status and his assertion that it takes two to tango and that even if discussions before and during sex with his partners revolved around intentions to practice safe sex, once they acquiesce during the act, then they are just as responsible for what happens as he is, no matter how much they or others cry victim.

A storm of disapprobation not surprisingly followed the boost in the bareback blogger's profile. Gawker's comments file was crammed with postings suggesting he be put on the next train to Dachau, other gay men's health listserves picked up the drumbeat of dismay and disgust. But this controversy is only the latest concerning the practice of serosorting.

Defined as guys choosing only to have unsafe sex with others of the same HIV-status, serosorting has been ade facto reality in gay men's lives since the AIDS epidemic started, and before, if you count guys choosing not have sex with others they knew to have an STD or saying fuck it , if they knew they both had herpes, or whatever.

Serosorting, however, is a concept that is exclusive to considerations of HIV prevention. It's based on the premise that men need to know their status and that if they do, and then limit their unsafe behavior to only others of the same status, that HIV infections will fall. This assumes of course that people take steps to learn their status, that their status stays the same, that they are honest about their status, and that others are too. It is true, by the way, that people are more likely to have safer sex if they know they are positive. This is part of the innate civic-mindedness and altruism of gay men, we'll come back to that later.

Serosorting has recently been picked up by some advocates and taken out of the realm of decisions that gay men make on their own and promoted as a serious prevention strategy to be encouraged. Last fall, the San Francisco Department of Public Health launched their "disclosure" campaign that links knowing your status and talking about it with potential sexual partners to intentionally choosing partners of the same status. And Robert Brandon Sandor, the organizer ofBrandon's Poz Parties, a longstanding occasional sex club event for poz guys in New York, took up the charge, hosting a forum at the gay center in Manhattan on serosorting a month later. Brandon has run afoul of some local public health advocates for his championing of serosorting, as they claim his promotion of the concept is overly simplistic.

For Brandon, serosorting means, if you are poz, and only fuck without condoms with other poz guys, HIV won't be transmitted and will eventually burn itself out. Critics note that the world is more complicated then this with people not sticking to the system, assuming things about other people's status, and remaining vulnerable to other STDS.

This also lays the burden on poz guys to have unsafe sex – or maybe by extention of the argument sex, period – only with other positive guys, but also for negative guys or guys of unknown status to continue to have sex only with condoms.

It's easy to fall into a moralistic discussion about sexual ethics when considering serosorting. But in fact the issue is really one that has been around forever and complicated forever: assessing risk. A noted HIV researcher once told me about a guy in Los Angeles he spoke to who would have unprotected sex if his partner had clean matching socks on. The reasoning went that if he was a nice, clean enough guy to have nice, clean enough socks, they it's likely he wasn't a skank and therefore HIV-negative. Sounds pretty silly, but it's a risk assessment strategy, albeit a poor one.

We are all responsible for making decisions about how much risk we can tolerate. Just about any sex can lead to the transmission of an STD; bottoming for anyone carries some risk of exposure to HIV, no matter how minimal if we choose to engage in sex, a major part of being alive, then we are taking risk. If we have sex with people we don't know, or with people we do know, but whose status we can't be 100 percent sure of, we are taking a risk.

While serosorting is a strategy that attempts to lower that risk, as Bareback Top makes clear, sometimes, for whatever reason, we are likely to be taking risk with less than complete information. Like we do when we are drunk, or high, or deeply in love, or deeply in lust, or inexperienced, or desperate, or stupid or lonely. How much risk we are willing to take is a combination of our mind's intelligent assessment and our hearts over-riding blindness to circumstance based on our desire in the moment. That leads back to the altruism issue. What alternately upsets and turns people on about Bareback Top is that he puts his needs for sexual satisfaction and thrill above others. He turns other people into objects, his playthings, and gets a kick out of when their intentions to protect themselves and others are undermined by their desire for hot sex and closeness with another human being. 

In his most recent posting, Bareback Top describes fucking a young guy without a condom and his assumption that it's the first time the kid has been fucked, He says that the kid was clearly in pain. But he did what he wanted and took care of his own needs, popping a nut up the guy's tender ass. Did he give the young man HIV? Probably not, presuming he's still correct that he doesn't have HIV. Did he give the kid any other STD, who knows? Did he use another human being for his own pleasure at the cost of his own and the other person's humanity? Sounds like. That occurs with a cost that Bareback Top has yet to become aware of. You pay for such cavalier games with a little piece of your soul.

Most of us have probably used other people at some time or another for our own gratification. That's called exploitation. The lucky among us learn to regret it.

ACT UP Co-Founder and AIDS Activist Spencer Cox Passes Away at 44

via Windy City Times, by David France

Spencer Cox, the pivotal AIDS activist who co-founded two important and ongoing AIDS treatment initiatives and achieved great strides in focusing global attention on the disease and the need for drugs to control the epidemic, died this morning at Columbia Presbyterian of AIDS related causes. He was 44 (March 10, 1968).

As a very young man fresh from Bennington, where he studied Theater and English Literature, he arrived in NYC after finishing just 3 years. He was diagnosed with HIV soon thereafter. By 1989, at age 20, he had become spokesman for ACT UP during its zenith through the early 90s. A member of its renowned Treatment & Data committee, and later co-founder of TAG (the Treatment Action Group), he schooled himself in the basic science of AIDS and became something of an expert, a "citizen scientist" whose ideas were sought by working scientists. In the end, Spencer wrote the drug trial protocol which TAG proposed for testing the promising protease inhibitor drugs in 1995. Adopted by industry, it helped develop rapid and reliable answers about the power of those drugs, and led to their quick approval by the FDA.

Even before ACT UP, he began work for amfAR (known at the time as The American Foundation for AIDS Research), first as a college intern, eventually going on staff as assistant to Director of Public Affairs, responsible for communications and policy.

Cox left there to co-found the Community Research Initiative on AIDS (now the AIDS Community Research Initiative of America, ACRIA) with Dr. Joseph Sonnabend and Marisa Cardinale . At ACRIA, he ran public affairs and edited all publications.

From 1994 to 1999, he was Director of the HIV Project for TAG, where he did his groundbreaking work in drug trials designs. He designed the drug trial adopted in part by Abbott as they were developing Norvir, the first Protease Inhibitor to head into human trials. It was had an "open standard-of-care arm," allowing people on the control arm to take any other anti-AIDS drugs their doctors prescribed, versus the arm taking any other anti-AIDS drugs plus Norvir. It was this study that showed a 50% drop in mortality in 6 months. Norvir was approved in late 1995. Though the results were positive, the proposal sharply divided the community, many of whom thought it was cruel to withhold Norvir on the control arm. Spencer defended himself in a controversial BARON'S cover story that made him, briefly, the most-hated AIDS activist in America. Ultimately he was vindicated.

"Spencer single-handedly sped up the development and marketing of the protease inhibitors, which currently are saving 8 million lives," says TAG executive director Mark Harrington . "He was absolutely brilliant, just off the charts brilliant,"

After the plague was transformed with the drug revolution, he was the first to see there would be a psychological burden to address in the gay community members who survived the worst of the epidemic. He founded the MEDIUS INSTITUTE FOR GAY MEN'S HEALTH, a think tank focusing on gay male emotional health. MEDIUS produced several important reports but failed to find the financial support it needed to continue his work.

Read the rest

Lessen HIV Burden Among Young Gay and Bisexual Men

via The National Minority AIDS Council (NMAC) nmac.org

Call to Action: Lessen HIV Burden Among Young Gay and Bisexual Men in the United States

When new infections among young Black gay men increase by nearly fifty percent in three years, we need to do more to show them that their lives matter. - President Barack Obama, December 1, 2011

We will never end the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the US until we dramatically lessen the burden of HIV among gay and bisexual men, particularly young men.

Across race, age, and geography, gay and bisexual men remain most vulnerable to HIV infection in the United States. Gay and bisexual men are the only group of people in which new HIV infections are increasing each year. They represent only 2% of the US population, yet account for 64% of new infections. Young gay and bisexual men aged 13-29 comprise less than 1% of the US population, but account for 27% of all new infections.  Black young men are especially hard hit by the AIDS epidemic, experiencing a shocking 48% increase in the number of new HIV infections between 2006 and 2009.

Despite alarming infection rates, the response to HIV/AIDS among young gay and bisexual men has never been adequate. Allocation of prevention, research, and other resources to focus on gay men overall or young men, in particular, has never been equal to their proportion of the epidemic. Negative experiences and other barriers to accessing health care have left too many young men estranged from the services and institutions that could support healthy sexual, physical, and emotional development. Family rejection, social isolation, homophobia, and absent legal protections have perpetuated a cycle of homelessness, unemployment, substance use, and poverty among the most vulnerable.

To achieve the goals of the National HIV/AIDS Strategy for the US – (1) to reduce new HIV infections, (2) to improve access to health care, and (3) to eliminate health disparities – particular attention must be paid to young gay and bisexual men, for too many of whom HIV infection has become a rite of passage to adulthood. We can and must respond to HIV/AIDS in a way that respects and cares for all people living with HIV, while recognizing the unique impact of HIV on young gay and bisexual men.

We have never been better equipped to mount a comprehensive response to HIV among young gay and bisexual men. Social marketing campaigns and affirming messages from the highest levels of leadership are beginning to validate years of hard work promoting equality and dignity. The Affordable Care Act will offer health care to millions who have been denied access for decades. Scientific research has demonstrated both sustained health improvement and a dramatic reduction in transmission among people living with HIV who initiate treatment early after diagnosis.

We can achieve an AIDS-free generation for ALL young gay and bisexual men in the United States, but only if we make the commitment to change today.

Sign on to this initiative by clicking here. Both individual and organizational endorsement are welcomed: http://alturl.com/zojpo 

Read the rest

New Ad Campaign Offers Help for HIV-Positive Pregnant Women

As Mother’s Day Approaches, “None Born Positive” Campaign Puts Spotlight on Resources, Support for HIV-Positive Pregnant Women

Public education initiative features radio public service announcements, ads on bus shelters, Chicago Transit Authority trains and buses

CHICAGO – Jazz had little hope when she was diagnosed as HIV-positive. She was pregnant, unstably housed and recently separated from the father of her two young children, who still depended on her for care.

But after finding stable housing and consistent medical treatment, among other support services, Jazz’s baby was born HIV-negative. If you didn’t know that was possible, you’re not alone.

That’s why the Pediatric AIDS Chicago Prevention Initiative (PACPI) has partnered with the AIDS Foundation of Chicago (AFC) and the Cause Marketing Initiative at the Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications at Northwestern University to launch a public education initiative called “None Born Positive.” See ads here

Across Chicago, starting April 30, 2012, you will begin to see public transit and bus shelter ads (like the one pictured right) that encourage people to know their HIV status and to call PACPI if they’re HIV-positive and pregnant (or considering pregnancy).

“It's so important for women to realize why knowing their status is critical. Everyone should get tested and know their status — not just pregnant women who can prevent the transmission of HIV to their infants,” said Anne Statton, executive director of PACPI. “Do it for your own mother, in honor of Mother’s Day (Sunday, May 13).”

Read the rest

GMHC on Needle Exchange Funding Ban

via Advocate, by Neal Broverman

Congress removed funding for syringe exchange programs in the budget they passed last week and the Gay Men's Health Crisis say that was a big mistake.

Federal funding for needle exchanges, which studies show reduce HIV transmissions, was removed during the tenure of George W. Bush; it returned when Barack Obama took office.

But the Republican-controlled House has worked repeatedly to remove the funding since then and they were successful last week.

"New York City experienced a 78% decline in reported HIV infections among intravenous drug users since syringe exchange became available (from 1990 to 2002) - supported by state and local funds," according to a press release from the New York-based GMHC. 

GMHC CEO Marjorie Hill calls Congress's ban on federal funding extremely shortsighted.

"How do you get to zero new infections when you let ideology stand in the way of using existing proven tools to reduce the rate of HIV infection," Hill said in the release.

"It is hypocritical that Congress would allow this retrograde policy to be put back into place. It is especially reprehensible that this step was taken during the 30th year of the epidemic when, as stated by the federal government, the tools exist to end the spread of HIV.

This action, along with the decision to wastefully spend taxpayer dollars on disproven abstinence-only education demonstrates a clear lack of commitment by Congress to seriously confront HIV."


Read the rest

"He Won't Wear a Condom"

via Advocate, by Steven Petrow

Question: Every so often I meet a guy who tells me he just won’t use a condom because (take your pick): (1) He can’t stay hard; (2) He’s too big; (3) He’s allergic to latex; (4) He’s HIV-negative; or 5) It’s a mood killer. How do you suggest I handle these situations — especially when I’m really turned on?

Answer:  Let me start today by noting that it’s World AIDS Day, which is observed December 1 each year and — as the official site in the U.K. proclaims — “is an opportunity for people worldwide to unite in the fight against HIV, show their support for people living with HIV and to commemorate people who have died.”

That being said, there’s no better way to observe this day than to pledge to protect yourself and your prospective partners from HIV.

And if there’s any tool we have to prevent the continued spread of the virus, it’s the much-maligned, low-tech (but lifesaving) condom. 

I know you’ve heard this before (I certainly hope that you have) but latex and plastic rubbers, when used properly (and yes, that’s key) with a water-based lubricant, provide a high degree of protection to each partner.

But sometimes information alone doesn’t do the trick. If only. Instead of going to the experts (as Mr. Manners often does) I decided to ask a friend of mine who recently became infected why his knowledge of safer sex didn’t safeguard him:

“You can be armed with all of the information in the world, but it's much harder to put it into practice when you combine casual sex, alcohol, and drugs — and put places like Fire Island into the mix,” he told me.

“My suspicion is that somewhere along the line I wasn't sober enough to do what I needed to do to protect myself, and there were enough of those nights that the statistical odds became stacked against me.”

So, how do I suggest you respond to these periodic ploys (and that’s what they are) to have unprotected sex?  It would be facile for me to suggest that you just say no.

Still, you can’t make sound judgments if you’re stoned, high, drunk, tweaked, or toasted — and there’s no question that drug and alcohol use are closely linked with new HIV infections.


Read the rest

Empowering Young, Black, Gay Men for HIV Prevention

via HuffPost Gay Voices, by Charles Stevens

The most recent statistics indicate that an entire generation is being impacted by HIV on an epic scale.

HIV cases among young, black, gay and bisexual men increased to an estimated 48 percent between 2006 and 2009, according to new data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Ultimately, it is impossible to discuss HIV/AIDS in the black community without addressing the importance of tolerance.

It is up to us -- relatives, co-workers and friends -- to engage our black, gay brothers in a conversation that is constructive and rooted in concern, one that turns to them for insight instead of turning them away.

There have been significant political and medical advances made in HIV/AIDS prevention.

The National AIDS Strategy, a key achievement of Barack Obama's presidency, is a prime example. By focusing with laser precision on at-risk groups and prioritizing addressing disparities in HIV, there will be historic gains.

On the scientific front, advances in biomedical HIV-prevention tools, such as pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, have given us signs of hope even as we take a collective gasp at the work ahead of us.

However, HIV has never been merely a public health issue but a social one, as well. It is an issue that impacts us not only abstractly but also in a very real and tangible way.

The black community as a whole has made substantial progress, more than is credited, in terms of embracing our diversity. Many unsung heroes and heroines have taken great strides in challenging anti-gay attitudes.

Straight allies have also spoken out unapologetically in support of their gay brethren. However, there is still work to do, and HIV/AIDS makes building bridges across orientations even more critical.

The black community has just as much of an incentive to be a part of the solution: the "win" is the lives of our people, the lives of young, black, gay men. These men are valued; their lives are priceless. They are assets to our communities.

Read the rest

Kickin' the Meth Habit!

via sfgate, by Erin Allday

Methamphetamine addicts who took an antidepressant medication every day were far less dependent on the drug after three months than those who took a placebo, according to a study released Monday by the San Francisco Public Health Department.

Addiction treatment experts said the findings were encouraging, especially given how notoriously difficult it can be to help methamphetamine addicts kick their dependence.

But they added that the results will need to be confirmed in larger studies.

Researchers have for years been trying to find a drug to help alleviate dependency on methamphetamine, much as methadone can be used to help people quit heroin, but multiple studies of many different drugs have failed.

Addiction experts said they're cautiously optimistic that the antidepressant mirtazapine, sold under the brand name Remeron, will prove useful.

"This is exciting to see because with methamphetamine, virtually everything we've tried hasn't worked. There have been quite a few bombs pharmacologically," said Keith Humphreys, a Stanford psychiatry professor and a researcher at the Veterans Administration in Palo Alto who specializes in addiction. "At the same time, those earlier experiences have taught me to be cautious now."

Addiction on the rise

More than 1 million people in the United States use methamphetamine every year, and the nation has seen a resurgence in addiction to the drug in recent years, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

In San Francisco, among people who seek treatment for drug dependence, about 11 percent are abusing methamphetamine, according to the health department.

The study, results of which were published in the Archives of General Psychiatry, was run by Dr. Grant Colfax, director of HIV prevention at the Public Health Department.

His interest in treating methamphetamine addiction stems from the close connection between abuse of the drug and exposure to HIV infection.

Effects of methamphetamine include lowered inhibitions and increased feelings of invulnerability, which in turn can lead to risky sex behaviors like having unprotected sex or sex with multiple partners.

Regular use of methamphetamines among men who have sex with men can double the risk of HIV infection, Colfax said.


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Risky Business: Bareback Sex

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Hyper-Masculinity effects on Gay and Bi Men

via GoodTherapy

“Gay and bisexual men experience numerous negative health conditions, including high rates of mental health problems,” said Beth N. Fischgrund of the Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences at Northwestern University, and lead author of a new study examining masculinity and mental health in gay and bisexual men.

“Empirical studies show that a strong adherence to masculine norms is correlated with poor health outcomes, such as mental health problems and risky sexual behaviors.”

National studies have shown that gay men are nearly twice as likely to suffer from depression and anxiety as heterosexual men, and that suicide rates for these men are nearly double those of other men.

The way gay and bisexual men perceive their masculinity has a significant impact on mental health. “Society’s messages about sexuality are not the only cultural attitudes that sexual minority men are confronted with; cultural attitudes also delineate what it means to be a man,” said Fischgrund.

 She added that some men may exhibit hyper-masculine behaviors when they feel their masculinity is being threatened.
“Gay men who endorse hyper-masculine norms might then experience identity incongruence when they are presented with general society’s norms that differ and contradict their own.

 In these situations, the more integral the hyper-masculine norms are to a man’s identity, the more psychological distress he may experience.”

For her study, Fischgrund recruited 311 gay and bisexual men, nearly a third of which reported an HIV positive status.

 “Among these gay and bisexual men, those who adhered to norms that incorporate an interpersonal aspect of masculinity (i.e., conceptions of masculinity as social behavior or as sexual  behavior) endorsed higher levels of mental health distress than did men who adhered to norms that focus on the intrapersonal aspects of masculinity (i.e., conceptions of masculinity as physical appearance),” said Fischgrund.

“Additionally, men who did not know their HIV status endorsed higher levels of depression.” She emphasized the importance of her findings.

“Specifically, designing programs that center on altering the social and sexual masculine norms within the gay male community are needed to decrease the mental health burden of gay and bisexual men, which has been shown to be associated with HIV risky behaviors.”


See the rest

NBGMAC to Host a National Webinar for Young Black Gay, Bisexual and Same Gender Loving Men

The National Black Gay Men’s Advocacy Coalition (NBGMAC), co-sponsored by FHI 360, invites young Black Gay, Bisexual, and Same Gender Loving men from across the country to participate in a national webinar on October 14th, 2011 at 3:00PM (EDT) to develop solutions for addressing the HIV/AIDS epidemic within the young Black Gay, Bisexual, and Same Gender Loving community.

Click here to register!

Stop Transmitting Silence: Join us for the conversation

There is a disturbing rise
in the number of cases of STD/STI and HIV/AIDS
in the black community.

What can we do to stop this?

Come hear from elected officials, public health advocates,
faith-based leaders, parents and youth.

Wednesday, October 5th
6pm-8pm

Chicago Urban League
4510 S. Michigan Avenue
Chicago, IL 60653

Refreshments will be served.

"A Day with HIV in America" Take Your Best Shot!

via PRNewswire

Positively Aware magazine sponsors 2nd annual photo essay to be published in Nov/Dec 2011 issue

Whether you're HIV negative or positive, live with HIV or care for someone with HIV, Positively Aware, is asking people to share their stories through the lens of a camera on one, single day, September 21.

The second annual A Day with HIV in America will capture the collective portrait of those living with HIV to help remove the stigma of HIV and to advance a community of care and support.

Positively Aware, a leading magazine devoted to HIV treatment, is inviting people across America to snap a digital photograph at any time over the course of Wednesday, September 21.

Participants can record a portrait, time with friends and family at work or play, or any moment in the day that helps the world better understand how HIV affects their lives. Photos are to be submitted by September 26 on the A Day with HIV in America web site.

Follow A Day with HIV in America's Facebook page or on Twitter @A_Day_With_HIV to see updates and selected photographs, and to share the site and its vision with friends to help spread the word.

"We're asking all Americans affected by HIV to share with all of us an image of their life living with HIV," said Jeff Berry, editor of Positively Aware.

"Their vantage points captured over a single day will create a rich photographic tapestry of hope, strength and support that will help tear away the stigma of living with HIV in America today."

The final photos selected for the photo essay of A Day with HIV in America will be announced in October 2011 and will be published in the November/December issue of Positively Aware magazine.

 Positively Aware will also premiere the photos at the U.S. Conference on AIDS, November 10-13 in Chicago, Ill.

To learn more about this year's project, see last year's winners and to make your photo submission, visit, A Day with HIV in America.
Read the rest.

Simple Changes to Hook Up Sites Could Decrease Spread of HIV and Sexually Transmitted Diseases

Press release via Stop AIDS

A study released today recommends eight ways to reduce transmission of HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) among men who meet male sex partners online.

Owners of popular dating and “hook-up” websites and users of those websites, along nwith HIV and STD program directors, agreed that a few simple measures could have a major impact on the spread of sexually transmitted diseases.

Among the online measures supported by a majority of those surveyed:

• Including “safe sex” as a profile option and allowing users to search for partners by such characteristics

• Providing directories of STD testing locations

• Sending automatic reminders to get an HIV or STD test at regular intervals chosen by users

• Having chat-rooms and other areas for HIV-positive men looking for other HIV positive men

• Providing e-cards to notify partners of a potential exposure to STDs

• Posting videos that show men discussing safe sex, HIV status, and related issues

• Providing access to sexual health experts

“Finding sex and love online is here to stay,” said Dan Wohlfeiler, one of the study’s authors working with the California HIV/STD Prevention Training Center for this project. “This study shows how we can work with website owners to turn the Internet into a force for their users’ health.”

More than 3000 users, 82 state and local HIV and STD Program directors and 18 owners of dating and “hook-up” websites completed the survey.

Jen Hecht, Education Director at STOP AIDS Project and co-author, said “Since all three groups agree these strategies are important, can be done, and would be used, we need to be getting them online now.”

The study also found a number of strategies with less support. Website owners expressed skepticism about health department staff going online to notify users that they might have been exposed to an STD. In contrast, a majority of HIV and STD prevention directors and users thought this strategy was important. The authors are planning follow-up meetings with owners to further understand their concerns. In California, gay and bisexual men who were diagnosed with syphilis or gonorrhea most frequently reported the Internet as where they met sex partners.

“We have rising rates of STDs among gay and bisexual men and turning that around means everyone needs to take responsibility for their sexual health,” said Bill Smith, Executive Director of the National Coalition of STD Directors (NCSD). “This study shows how public health professionals, as well the users and owners of sex seeking websites, can band together to make a real difference in securing the sexual health of gay men.”

The study, entitled “How Can We Improve HIV and STD Prevention Online for MSM” funded by amfAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research, was co-authored by H. Fisher Raymond and Willi McFarland at the San Francisco Department of Public Health. The results have been posted here.

TOMORROW! Conversations: A Discussion about the Impact of the National HIV/AIDS Strategy on Black Gay/Bisexual Men in Chicago

 The Chicago Black Gay Men’s Caucus present.........

Conversations: A Discussion about the Impact of the National HIV/AIDS Strategy on Black Gay/Bisexual Men in Chicago

 TOMORROW!!
Thursday, August 11, 2011

6:00pm-9:00pm

Gary Comer Youth Center
7200 S. Ingleside (Located 2 blocks southeast of the intersection of East 71^st St., Cottage Grove Ave., and South Chicago Ave.)

 With special guests:

-- John A. Schneider, MD, MPH (Assistant Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology – University of Chicago)

-- Chris Brown (Assistant Commissioner of Public Health for the STI/HIV/AIDS Division – City of Chicago)

-- David D. Robertson (Prevention Specialist – Comer Children’s Hospital at the University of Chicago)

-- Mildred Williamson, PhD, MSW (HIV/AIDS Section Chief – Illinois Department of Public Health)

Moderated by: Keith R. Green, MSW (CBGMC Co-Chair/Director of Federal Affairs at the AIDS Foundation of Chicago)

Light refreshments will be served! Please RSVP to CBGMCevents@gmail.com

The Guilt Myth

via The Body, By Aless Piper

My very Christian friend won't pray for my friend with AIDS who is currently going through a rough time medically. Yes, I am pissed off. This is a person who will pray -- without hesitation -- for a man with lung cancer who smoked a pack a day (or more) since the age of 12 and is now sixty-odd. But because to my Christian friend's mind anyway, my friend had to have done something to get AIDS, s/he will not pray for him/her. Where's the logic in that one?

Now I'm not too sure if this person would appreciate prayers in the first place. S/he is an atheist, as are most of the people I know with HIV/AIDS. But that's not the point. The point is, my very Christian friend won't even offer to pray for him/her, or even to keep him/her in their thoughts.

I could continue to talk to a wall, but I want to talk it out here instead. Why is that love the sinner hate the sin mentality, which so many Christians boast, oddly absent when it comes to HIV/AIDS in America?

Subscribing to the school of thought that you shouldn't ask a question unless you have a half decent idea of the answer, I have a theory and it all comes down to this: guilt and innocence.

 

Edward explained it to me in 2005: "Some people use it [the knowledge of how someone was infected] to see if they can (morally/based on their value system) accept you. People who were infected through the blood system and secondarily infected are thought to be 'victims' while gay men are thought to be 'deserving' of it. No one deserves HIV. How we become infected is irrelevant."

Would you ask someone with lung cancer how they got it? More important, would it matter?

Read more.

HIV Epidemic Growing Fastest Among Black Gay and Bisexual Men

via Colorlines, By Kai Wright

Young black gay and bisexual men are the only population in the U.S. in which the pace of HIV’s spread is increasing, according to a startling study released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention yesterday.

CDC researchers looked at new infections between 2006 and 2009 and discovered that, as expected, we’re still logging roughly 50,000 new infections overall each year in the U.S. We’ve been at that level for several years. The study also re-confirmed that African Americans are a wildly disproportionate number of those new infections.

Blacks accounted for 44 percent of new infections, despite being just about 12 percent of the overall U.S. population in the 2010 Census.But CDC noted with alarm that, unlike all other subpopulations in the U.S., black gay and bisexual men between the age of 18 and 29 saw a dramatic increase in infections: up by 48 percent in the three-year span of the study.

“We are deeply concerned by the alarming rise in new HIV infections in young, black gay and bisexual men and the continued impact of HIV among young gay and bisexual men of all races,” CDC’s HIV prevention director Jonathan Mermin declared in a statement. “We cannot allow the health of a new generation of gay men to be lost to a preventable disease. It’s time to renew the focus on HIV among gay men and confront the homophobia and stigma that all too often accompany this disease.”

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Young gay meth users more likely to be exposed to HIV

via Pink News, By Jessica Geen

Young gay and bisexual men who use methamphetamine are more likely to be exposed to HIV, research suggests.

Most studies on the issue focus on older gay men, but the latest research suggests a link between use of the drug and risky sexual behaviour which can lead to HIV infection.

Researchers at the Northwestern University in Chicago looked at data collected in 2005 and 2006 on 595 gay and bisexual men aged between 12 and 24 in eight US cities.

The 64 who said they had used methamphetamine in the last three months were substantially more likely to have been involved in risky sexual behaviour.

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Size Matters?

 via Sandelson's posterous

A document that came from a large National Institutes of Health study that began in 2006, titled: “The Association Between Penis Size and Sexual Health Among Men Who Have Sex with Men” has been receiving a great deal of media attention.

This attention originated from Fox News and the Traditional Values Coalition, both seemingly pushing a political agenda. The attention is not simply because of the study’s conclusions, but because of the cost of original grant that came from the federal government and its link this study that examined penis size and sexual health .

The press discussing this article focused on some of the key findings that are easily sensationalized , namely; “Those gay men who felt they had small or inadequate penis sizes were more likely to become “bottoms,” or anal receptive, while gay men with larger penises were more likely to identify themselves as “tops,” or anal insertive. Another finding is also mentioned in most of the articles, a finding stating that men with smaller penises were more likely to be psychologically troubled than those with larger genitalia.

After reading the full publication, I can report that there was more to the study that just sexual positioning. It sought to explore four questions: First, to what extent is perceived penis size associated with penis size satisfaction? Second, understanding that condoms are often limited to a narrow range of available sizes, to what extent is perceived penis size associated with condom use, HIV, and STIs? Third, to what extent is perceived penis size associated with men’s sexual positioning (anal insertive vs. receptive)? Finally, to what extent is perceived penis size associated with psychosocial outcomes (e.g., adjustment in the GLBT community)?

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New H.I.V. Cases Persist at 50,000 a Year

via New York Times, By Donald G. McNeil Jr.

Despite years of great progress in treating AIDS, the number of new infections with the virus that causes it has remained stubbornly around 50,000 a year for a decade, according to new figures released on Wednesday by federal officials.

The American epidemic is still concentrated primarily in gay men, and is growing rapidly worse among young black gay men.

That realization is causing a rift in the AIDS community. Activists say the persistent infection rate proves that government prevention policy is a flop. Federal officials are on the defensive even as they concede that the epidemic will grow if prevention doesn’t get better, which they know is unlikely while their budgets are being cut.

And some researchers believe it is impossible to completely wipe out even a fatal, incurable disease when it is transmitted through sex and carries so much stigma that people deny having it and avoid being tested for it.

Looking backward, epidemiologists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention believe new cases peaked at 130,000 a year in the 1980s, sank slowly during the 1990s and plateaued at 50,000 around the year 2000.

Both Dr. Kevin Fenton, chief of AIDS prevention for the C.D.C., and Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, chief of AIDS research at the National Institutes of Health, took issue with Mr. Kramer’s interpretation. While both agreed that 50,000 new annual infections was, in Dr. Fauci’s words, “a great concern,” both pointed to some areas where substantial progress had been made and said that new studies were seeking ways to get more people tested and treated early in the course of the illness, which would make them less infectious and drive transmission rates down.

“The C.D.C. is absolutely not resting,” Dr. Fenton insisted. “It was a major accomplishment to drop infections from 130,000 to 50,000, and we’re dealing with an epidemic that is dynamic.”

But, he conceded, 50,000 is an “unacceptably high level,” and without better prevention efforts, “we’re likely to face an era of rising infection rates.”

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