After one performer tested positive this week, 16 previously unpublicized cases of HIV in the porn industry have emerged. Last time this happened, government officials called it an outbreak and porn production grinded to a halt for two months.
posted by hpliferaft on Jun 12, 2009 - 193 comments

HIV is a gay disease.
posted by thirteenkiller on Oct 5, 2006 - 87 comments

For the first time since the 1980s, the CDC estimates that there are more than 1 million people living with HIV in the United States. [MSNBC link, but the article is actually good.] This is good news and bad, it means more people are living with the disease with the help of Highly Active Anti-Retroviral Therapy (HAART), of which there are just over 20 drugs in 4 different classes. The CDC has recently launched a new prevention initiative targeted at people with the disease, rather than at convincing HIV- people to avoid contracting it. Central to the new effort are increased HIV surveillance methods, which basically boil down to increased testing (in the case of pregnant mothers, testing they would have to opt out of) and reporting of HIV positive testees. This despite the fact that there is plenty of evidence that HIV discrimination is alive and well.
The other discouraging news is that despite the success of HAART for controlling HIV, the adverse effects are significant, including much higher rates of heart attack and cardiac disease, increased incidence of diabetes and insulin resistance, lipodystrophy and very noticeable changes to how people look, lactic acidosis, as well as the more standard (and less toxic) problems of nausea and diarrhea. Up to 50% of people on HAART will experience these problems.
posted by OmieWise on Jun 13, 2005 - 80 comments

Increasingly, teens have begun to view oral sex as a way to avoid HIV, despite public health experts' warnings to the contrary. Turns out, the kids may be right.
posted by nathanstack on Jun 7, 2002 - 25 comments