Is Invoking Hitler the Right Way to Fight the AIDS Epidemic?

Germany's latest AIDS-awareness commercial evokes some strong emotions: shock, disgust, nausea. And that's exactly the point. The controversial ad, which was released online on Sept. 3 and starts running on German TV on Wednesday, shows a couple having steamy sex in a dimly lit room with menacing music playing in the background. The viewer only sees the back of the man's head until the very end, when the camera pans to his face — to reveal that he's Adolf Hitler. Then the slogan flashes across the screen: "AIDS is a mass murderer."

It's a strong message, but HIV/AIDS organizations in Germany are arguing over whether it's the right one. Rainbow, the AIDS awareness group spearheading the campaign — which also includes newspaper ads and posters featuring the images of other dictators like Stalin and Saddam Hussein — says it deliberately wants to provoke people, especially young Germans, into using condoms to help prevent the spread of HIV. "We want to give this terrible virus a face," Jan Schwertner, spokesman for Rainbow, tells TIME. "AIDS is a forgotten issue in Germany. It's been swept under the carpet. This shock campaign is necessary to get people thinking again."

Read the rest at Time.

Read an item about this on ABC News.

Read commentary by Shawn Syms on xtra.ca

Policing Caster Semenya's gender

Athlete forced to undergo "gender verification testing"

via xtra.ca, by Shawn Syms

Hair above her upper lip. The deep timbre of her voice. A muscular build. Her flatter-than average chest. A growing fixation on these corporeal cues is replacing the cheers that first met teenaged South African athlete Caster Semenya when she took the 800m gold medal at the world championship in Berlin last Wednesday.

Eighteen-year-old Semenya, who grew up in the village of Fairlee in South Africa's rural Limpopo province, has been forced to undergo "gender verification testing" at the hands of a team that includes an endocrinologist, gynecologist, internal-medicine specialist and a psychologist.

As a long-time member of the queer community, I've met a lot of women with deep voices and/or facial hair. In fact, across most people I've met I've seen a wide range of behaviour and self-presentation across the spectrum of culturally defined "masculine" and "feminine" traits, regardless of whether a person identified as a man or a woman. Or defined themselves in some other way.

Read the rest.

How is Shawn Syms healthy?

I work as a journalist and advocate to fight against unjust criminalization -- including the criminalization of sex work, drug use and HIV exposure. I believe each of these phenomena is ethically wrong and damaging to the health of the community at large. So when I help to inform and educate about these issues, it has a powerful effect of my spiritual and emotional well-being.

When it comes to the corporeal sphere, it's taken a long time for me to feel comfortable with my body as a larger-than-average guy. And it can sometimes be challenging to sift through all the societal stigma and stereotypes ("fat people are lazy and stupid," etc) to hear when there are valid messages about my physical health that I ought to act upon.

But when my doctor told me my sedentary ways had allowed my blood sugar and blood pressure creep up toward the danger zone, I knew I had to do something. I've never liked exercise much, but I joined a fitness "boot camp" with a friend from work -- we've been going three mornings a week for the past six months. And two weeks ago I decided to add running to the mix, so I've joined a running clinic where we train together 3 times a week and learn about how to avoid injuries. In truth, if I were doing this all by myself, I would probably never stick to it. It's the camaraderie and the rigid scheduling that helps keep me committed.

Since starting all this activity six months ago, I haven't lost any weight. In fact, I've actually gained five pounds! But I feel better than ever, and my doctor says my blood sugar's the best it's been "in years."

I turn 40 next year. I've heard the 40s can be a man's best decade. I can't wait to find out! And then to compare them to my 50s. And so on.

-- Shawn Syms
Toronto, Ontario


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Manitoba mistake: Forced HIV testing is never justified

via Shawn Syms
extra.ca

Manitoba legislators are poised to force people to get tested for HIV and hand over the results. The Testing of Bodily Fluids and Disclosure Act — introduced earlier this month by the province's health minister Theresa Oswald — is supposed to protect first responders such as paramedics, or anyone else who offers first aid to an injured person.

According to a Winnipeg Free Press report, the legislation would allow someone to apply for a judicial blood-testing order if they believe they've been exposed to a blood-borne disease, such as HIV or hepatitis.

A health minister should know better. Oswald claims this bill would provide "peace of mind" to emergency workers — but the law would offer little protection at too great a human-rights cost.

The best way to show respect for the efforts of first responders and health care professionals — and demonstrate genuine dedication to their health and safety — is to provide education about the actual risks, and implement safeguards to reduce those risks.

Workplace exposure to HIV is not impossible — but the real risk is dramatically low. So much so, there has only been one confirmed case in Canada over the past twenty-five years. According to the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network, practical things that would actually offer protection against occupational exposure include needles with safety features that reduce the possibility of needlestick injuries, Kevlar-lined gloves for police officers and proper containers for the disposal of sharp implements.

And if there is a genuine risk of HIV exposure, a person can take a one-month course of treatment called post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP), which is believed to greatly reduce any likelihood of infection.

If someone's broken skin, mucus membranes or internal tissues have clearly been exposed to someone else's blood, they should get PEP. If not, they likely shouldn't. Some paramedics have argued they need the other person's test results to determine if PEP is needed. That's a mistake.

A potentially exposed person needs to go on PEP almost immediately, within mere hours after the risky incident. Forcing a test and awaiting the results means too much delay. And a negative test result could offer false reassurance, because of the window period before HIV is detectable.

Forced testing offers no benefit in the case of diseases like hepatitis either. All health workers should be vaccinated against Hep B and there is no preventative treatment for Hep C, so there is no benefit to knowing if the potential source person has it. On the other hand, when someone's HIV status is exposed to others unnecessarily, the risks can be unpredictable and life-changing.

We may imagine times have changed, but according to a survey by the Public Health Association of Canada, "20 percent of Canadians do not believe in supporting the rights of people with HIV/AIDS" — and many people would wrongly avoid even casual contact with someone HIV-positive. So people living with the virus have every right to be wary of human-rights abuses and undeserved mistreatment.

Let's show the life-saving efforts of professionals dedicated to our health and safety — and well as the rights, security and well-being of people with HIV — the concern, appreciation and respect that they all deserve.

For more information, see the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network's excellent primer on forced HIV testing.

Got PrEP?

What would you do if there were a pill that could prevent HIV infection? Would you throw your rubbers out the window? Would you feel safer?

Shawn Syms / Xtra.ca /reports on adding to the HIV prevention toolkit

Maybe it was a condom that broke — Daniel doesn't like to talk about the details. "It was just a stupid accident, and not even something usually considered too risky." But it's how he went from loving a man with HIV, to living with HIV himself.

But what if taking a pill a day could have reduced his risk of infection? "We had years of practice playing safe, so that might have seemed like overkill," says Daniel. "But looking back now, I think it would have been nice to have that option."

Long-term serodiscordant couples — where one partner is HIV-negative, the other positive — are just one of the potential candidates for a new HIV prevention technology under development called pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP.

The theory behind PrEP is that some of the same drugs that people with HIV use to manage their infection may also be capable of preventing the virus from taking hold in someone's body in the first place. A study published on Jan 15 showed that PrEP prevented HIV transmission in mice. And human safety trials are underway, including one involving 4,000 gay men in Lima, Peru.

"We are still years away from knowing whether PrEP will be a safe and effective option for people," says Jim Pickett, who heads advocacy efforts at the AIDS Foundation of Chicago and calls himself "an ardent supporter of new prevention technologies." But he's optimistic about PrEP because the results are encouraging so far.

Read the rest here.

Your ass on the line

Fighting anal cancer

by Shawn Syms, writing in Xtra.ca

[thanks for alerting LifeLube to your great article, Shawn!]

Are you a back-door man? Then you could be at risk for anal cancer.

Gay men are disproportionately likely to develop this otherwise uncommon condition — but the prognosis for prevention and treatment is good, as long as you're armed with knowledge and an appropriate level of medical support.

Certain types of human papillomavirus (HPV) can lead to anal cancer. HPV — the world's most common sexually transmitted infection — can block production of naturally occurring proteins. These proteins protect against the conditions in which anal cancer can arise, according to a report by Toronto cancer researcher Dr Irving Salit.

In particular, abnormal cells called anal dysplasia may appear — and when they cluster into visible lesions, they can become cancerous. Anal play, especially unprotected receptive sex, can expose you to HPV.

"Testing and treatment need to be made more available," says Duncan MacLachlan, gay men's outreach coordinator at the AIDS Committee of Toronto. "Gay men's health needs to be valued equally to teenage girls in Ontario with respect to the provision of the new HPV vaccine."

MacLachlan is referring to Gardasil, a vaccine that protects against the strains of HPV associated with cervical and anal cancers. The Ontario government launched a campaign this summer to vaccinate young girls before they are sexually active.

Read the rest.