Sexually Transmitted Diseases

Porn's 4th Case of HIV Confirmed, With a 5th Possible, Group Says

Even as the porn industry says an HIV-related production shut-down was scheduled to end Friday, the AIDS Healthcare Foundation today said it has confirmed that a fourth performer has come up HIV-positive. See also: Porn's Latest HIV-Related Production Shut-Down to End. The group, which has spearhe ... More >>

Porn's 4th HIV Doubted by Adult Biz Group

The adult video industry's lobbying group last night cast doubt on reports that a fourth performer has come up HIV-positive following an outbreak affecting at least three porn stars. See also: Porn Biz Sees Fourth Case of HIV. The Free Speech Coalition called it a case of "rumors" and accused the ... More >>

Porn's HIV Case Didn't Originate On-Set

The porn industry's lobbying group said last night that a performer who has initially turned up positive for HIV did not contract the virus on-set. As the Free Speech Coalition set out to ease fears of an STD outbreak, its leader, CEO Diane Duke, said " ... there is no indication of on-set transmis ... More >>

Porn Stars Face New Testing For Hepatitis

Following a performer's claim that a man she was scheduled to work with might have tested positive for Hepatitis C, the organization in charge of the industry's STD testing protocols announced the addition of Hepatitis tests starting today. That means performers who work for legit, mostly L.A.-base ... More >>

Porn's Syphilis Scare is Bunk, Adult Group Says

That hoopla over a porn star who might have tested positive for syphilis and then possibly exposed 15 others (damn, porn stars really do get around) turned out to be much ado about nothin,' at least according to the adult industry lobbying group known as the Free Speech Coalition. The organization ... More >>

Oral Sex & Cancer: Should You Go Down?

So can going down cause cancer? You better hope not, because it would be the greatest excuse ever for your partner to stay off his knees. After Michael Douglas announced that cunnilingus was to blame for his throat cancer, it set off a storm of media coverage. We talked to an expert at UCLA who say ... More >>

Porn's 'Mr. Marcus' Jailed for Exposing Co-Stars to Syphilis

Spread an STD, go to jail? In this case, the answer is yes. The man widely believed to be behind the porn industry's syphilis scare last year, adult performer Mr. Marcus, was sentenced today to 30 days behind bars for "knowingly exposing at least two co-stars to syphilis after testing positive for ... More >>

The Meth-Gay Sex Nightmare

Daniel Robison barely escaped the deadly addiction

Porn Condom Law Unconstitutional, Says Scholar Antonio M. Haynes

Measure B, the L.A. county initiative that passed last week with nearly 56 percent approval, is all about worker safety in adult video, say its backers. But some folks, including porn industry leaders, say the requirement to use prophylactics in porn is a restriction on free speech. Some lawyers s ... More >>

300 Porn Stars Treated for Syphilis

The porn industry's official STD service announced this week that 300 adult performers have been tested following a syphilis scare started by one Mr. Marcus. That's a lot of porn stars. But it doesn't appear to be nearly enough for the industry to be able to say all performers have been tested. ... More >>

Porn Production Back This Weekend as New Syphilis Test Saves The Day

The porn industry has a new syphilis test that just might save the day. After a nearly two-week ban on production, adult video shoots are clear to restart this weekend, an industry official told the Weekly. Following a syphilis scare that L.A. county health officials say has infected as many as 9 p ... More >>

Porn Star Mr. Marcus Admits He Started Syphilis Scare, Masked STD Test

A performer who works under the name Mr. Marcus came forward this week as the self-admitted patient zero in the industry's latest STD scare, this one over syphilis. Mr. Marcus met with representatives of Adult Video News, news site XBIZ, his studio, Evil Angel, and the porn industry lobby known as ... More >>

Porn Shutdown Likely Following Syphilis Reports

A reported outbreak of syphilis among adult video performers has prompted industry leaders to call for a temporary production shutdown. Adult Production Health & Safety Services, the industry's STD testing arm, has called for a "temporary moratorium" on film shoots after it says at least one perfor ... More >>

Entire Porn Industry Treated For Syphilis as Adult Video Production Shuts Down Today

The porn industry went dark today. The Free Speech Coalition, the adult video industry's lobbying group, told LA Weekly that Porn Valley's major studios were complying with the Adult Production Health & Safety Services' call for a production moratorium following an apparent syphilis outbreak. The ... More >>

Sex Disease Up in California; Young People Across U.S. Having Risky Oral Relations, Too

Teens and twentysomethings are having lots of oral sex, it seems, partly because they think it's safer than the other kind, according to a new Centers for Disease Control study. It's not true that oral is safer, of course, and this might explain why American kids are coming up with increasing rates ... More >>

AIDS Healthcare Foundation Turns 25, Continues to Grow Globally

The HIV/AIDS advocacy group that brings you those condom and HIV-testing billboards all over Los Angeles turned 25 over the weekend, as first reported by LGBT POV. Founded by the feisty Michael Weinstein, AIDS Healthcare Foundation has been on the front lines of battling HIV/AIDS since 1987 -- a p ... More >>

5 Crazy Sex Myths You Learned in High School

Once upon a time, I taught sex ed to high schoolers. Not to brag or anything, but I could roll a condom onto a banana in front of a classroom of 15-year-olds and maintain my composure. No big deal. What I had a harder time maintaining composure about, though, were the egregiously misguided myths a ... More >>

Condoms Suck

We're spending billions to develop an HIV vaccine. Why not also focus on building a better condom?

Men Have Dirtier Mouths Than Women

Some of you have really dirty mouths. And we're not just talking about the performers in Porn Valley who now have to use condoms on location shoots under a new city of L.A. law. A new study published this week in the journal JAMA says that seven percent of the folks in the U.S. aged 14 to 69 have t ... More >>

HIV Infections in Los Angeles: There's a Map For That

So you want to know how many of your neighbors have HIV or where the hotspots for the virus are in L.A. County? There's a map for that. A new location service developed with the help of Emory University called www.aidsvu.org will help you fined "zip-code-level" info on HIV cases. L.A. will be one ... More >>

Ready for Some Action?

UCLA Scientists Invent HIV-Blocking Anal Gel

cure.med.ucla.eduDr. Peter Anton, who led the study.​In the worldwide race to cure HIV, researchers out of Los Angeles have made some of the biggest recent breakthroughs. By late 2009, UCLA had discovered human blood stem cells could be used to fight HIV-infected cells. And by this August, USC ... More >>

South L.A.'s Rampant Chlamydia Problem to Be Tackled by... Local Church Ladies?

South L.A. gets tested.​Another "don't ask, don't tell" policy is being trampled today in the Southland: The backward, Palin-vetted, abstinence-only approach to sex-ed that's long plagued popular Christian culture. About 18 churches throughout L.A. County Supervisor Mark-Ridley Thomas' STD-ri ... More >>

Porn Industry Gets Back to Work as Performer Thought to be HIV Positive Apparently Isn't

Star ForemanDearth Vader look-a-like at Exxxotica convention last month.​It was the HIV case that set off a war of words between the porn industry and the AIDS Healthcare Foundation. And it turns out it wasn't an HIV case at all. The adult video trade group Free Speech Coalition (FSC) announc ... More >>

Criticism of Porn's HIV Scare Sparks Outrage at Manwin, the Adult Video Juggernaut That Employed Performer in Question

mofos.com​Updated at the bottom with the AIDS Healthcare Foundation's response. First posted at 5:09 p.m. The company that employed a porn star who might be HIV-positive today said the man did not continue to work, nor did he work with other performers, after a test indicated he might have th ... More >>

Born to Act Up

Richard Zaldivar: The Man Behind the Wall

AIDS Isn't Over, People, So Stop Acting Like it Is: A Warning From HIV's First Responder, UCLA's Michael Gottlieb

michaelgottliebmd.comDr. Michael S. Gottlieb.​A lot of you kids out there just don't remember the days when sex could kill and condoms weren't just optional. It's unfortunate, because as the 30th anniversary of the discovery of AIDS approaches in June, it's still a full-on, official epidemic, ... More >>

Elizabeth Taylor AIDS Activist Mourned By Non-Profit Leaders in Los Angeles

HIV/AIDS activist Elizabeth Taylor​Elizabeth Taylor's passing is mourned by HIV/AIDS activists in Los Angeles. Taylor had worked on the front lines of HIV/AIDS activism for decades, especially after the 1985 death of her longtime friend, movie star Rock Hudson. "She was a singular champion ... More >>

L.A. Porn Lobby Claims L.A. County Public Health Officials Demanded Blood Test From Adult Performer

Put 'em up and give us your STD test results.​Freeze. Now give us a blood sample. Scary enough if the people asking are carrying a badge. But in this case they weren't. At least according to the Free Speech Coalition, the L.A.-based porn lobby. The group claims this week that L.A. County ... More >>

Derrick Burts, Porn Actor Who Sparked Latest HIV Scare In San Fernando Valley Industry, Speaks Up For Condom Use (But Offers Strange Story Of How He Came Up Positive)

MySpaceDerrick Burts.​A performer who set off the latest HIV scare in adult film has turned against his employers and is speaking out against the adult video industry and its resistance to mandatory condom use. Derrick Burts teamed up with the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which unleashed his t ... More >>

Porn Industry Group Finally Reports HIV Case To L.A. County Health Officials

The porn industry took its time reporting an HIV-positive actor.​The porn industry's main health-care organization caved and sent the results from a positive HIV test to the county, as mandated by state law. The Adult Industry Medical (AIM) Healthcare Foundation turned the results in Tuesday ... More >>

Porn Actor Has HIV, But L.A. County Health Department Has Yet To Do Anything About It, According To AIDS Healthcare Group

diebmx via FlickrIs the county lagging on HIV-in-porn report?​Is the porn industry pushing its luck with this latest report of HIV? The AIDS Healthcare Foundation says it is. According to AHF, Adult Industry Medical (AIM) Healthcare, the group that conducts voluntary STD testing for the adul ... More >>

San Fernando Valley Porn Actor Tests Positive For HIV; AIDS Activists Who Want Mandatory Condoms In Porn Say We Told You So

Steve LaAIDS Healthcare Foundation protested outside Larry Flynt Publications recently. ​A porn actor has tested positive for HIV, the industry's health care foundation has told reporters. It doesn't come as a surprise: Several actors in the San Fernando-based biz have tested positive in the ... More >>

Movie Review: The Other City

Desmond Tutu Criticizes President Barack Obama's AIDS Strategy

Rev. Desmond Tutu​AIDS Healthcare Foundation president Michael Weinstein isn't the only person slamming President Barack Obama's AIDS strategy, which L.A. Weekly reported last week. Now Nobel Peace Prize winner Desmond Tutu has spoken out. "I appreciate that tough financial times require the ... More >>

Was George Bush's AIDS Strategy Better Than Barack Obama's?

AIDS Healthcare Foundation​AIDS Healthcare Foundation founder Michael Weinstein came out swinging yesterday at a Washington D.C. press conference, offering up that President Barack Obama's AIDS strategy measures up poorly to his predecessor's, former president George W. Bush. "The New York T ... More >>

Feds Investigate Porn Healthcare Organization For Allegedly Releasing Stars' Medical Records

The AIM crew, with founder Sharon Mitchell at bottom, right.​The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has opened an investigation of the Adult Industry Medical (AIM) Health Care Foundation, the Sherman Oaks nonprofit organization that handles STD testing for the porn industry, it was a ... More >>

AIDS Activist Richard Zaldivar Puts Archbishop Jose Gomez on Notice

AIDS activist Richard Zaldivar​AIDS activist Richard Zaldivar put Los Angeles Archbishop Jose Gomez on notice the other day -- firmly, yet respectfully demanding that the church play a more vigorous role in preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS in the Latino community. "Roughly 70 percent of our ... More >>

Group Aiming To Force Condoms On Porn Industry Appeals Case

​The AIDS Healthcare Foundation announced Thursday that it's appealing a lawsuit it brought in an effort to force Los Angeles County health officials to require condoms on porn sets in L.A. The suit had been dismissed by the Los Angeles Superior Court; now AHF is taking it to the Second Distr ... More >>

Huge AIDS Breakthrough From UCLA Announced (Application, Though, Still Likely Far Off)

UCLA AIDS Institute.​UCLA researchers this week published data that for the first time shows human blood stem cells can be engineered to attack HIV-infected cells and that the process could not only prove to be a breakthrough for AIDS patients but also for the sufferers of other viral diseases ... More >>

Group Tries To Force Condoms On Porn Stars (Good Luck With That)

Porn star Belladonna.​The AIDS Healthcare Foundation has been on a tear against the porn industry and its often unhealthy ways. On Friday it convened a UCLA symposium of health-care groups in a step toward getting the state to force male porn stars to use condoms. God bless them for it, but ... More >>

Queer Town: Hollywood Protest Slams Schwarzenegger's Cuts to HIV/AIDS Services

With L.A. City Councilman Bernard Parks, L.A. County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky and AIDS Healthcare Foundation President Michael Weinstein in attendance, a crowd of more than1,000 people gathered in front of the Hollywood Forever Cemetery on Friday afternoon, shut down Santa Monica Boulevard and pro ... More >>

Aids Conference Take 3: Lost in Translation

AIDS Conference Take 1: Rejecting Bill Clinton

The AIDS Conference opened with a bang on Monday: An activist take-over of a symposium hosted by a pharmaceutical company (which decided to stop distributing HIV drugs to kids) and a speech by Bill Clinton where I suppose he said some quotable things. On Sunday night the gala opening happened at ... More >>

Letters: PSA on STDs

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Gay Syphilis Scourge Skyrockets

County officials dawdle, leisurely launching another questionable ad campaign

Michael Kearns

The Actorvist