Prostitutes shun condoms in sex capital
From correspondents in Beijing
Agence France-Presse
MORE than half of Beijing’s prostitutes do not use condoms
despite sexual transmission having replaced drug use as the most common infection route for HIV, state media says.
Just 47 per cent of the 90,000 sex workers in China’s capital used condoms, the official Xinhua news agency quoted Fang Laiying, director of the municipal public health bureau, as saying on Tuesday.
Sexual transmission has also replaced intravenous drug use as the most common transmission route for the HIV virus for the first time in Beijing, accounting for 55 per cent of infections, the report said.
But the infection rate among the city’s prostitutes was unknown as Beijing does not provide a testing program.
Free condoms are already provided in 22,000 venues in China’s capital, including hotels and holiday resorts, and nearly 3,000 vending machines have been installed in entertainment sites, Xinhua said.
Condom machines are also to be installed at construction sites which employ more than 500 workers by the end of the year, Fang was quoted as saying.
Beijing had reported 5635 instances of people living with AIDS or HIV by November 1 since the first case was reported in 1985, of which 75 per cent were from other regions in China, Xinhua said.
At the end of 2007, China had around 700,000 people living with HIV, including an estimated 85,000 who had developed AIDS, according to Xinhua.
Campaigners have previously warned that
the true figure could be up to 10 times higher
.
Thousands were infected during the 1990s through tainted transfusions at illegal blood collection stations, but the focus of attention is now shifting to high risk groups such as gay men and sex workers.
Prostitutes shun condoms in sex capital | World News | News.com.au
Thieves steal 4000 condoms
THIEVES have stolen 4000 condoms and a seven-metre inflatable replica, after driving off in a “condom-mobile” before dumping it in a car park in Mexico City.
The thieves also took sound equipment and the motor to inflate the giant condom, but left 2500 HIV tests, said Apolonio Gomez, from the Sol collective, which has toured Mexico promoting HIV/AIDS prevention for the past 10 years.
The truck had just finished a five-week tour of 10 of Mexico’s 32 states, during which it distributed more than 80,000 male condoms and 2000 female condoms.
Thieves steal 4000 condoms | Breaking News | News.com.au
Street renamed in sex-toy mystery
By Nick Calacouras, February 09, 2009 12:00am
RESIDENTS in a rural part of
Darwin
have renamed their street "
Dildo Boulevard
" after 30 sex toys were found lying in front of a house.
Robert Johns and Laurelle Bates discovered the mysterious toys as they left for work early Friday. “It’s a real mystery. We have no idea where they came from,” Ms Bates told the NT News. “I know they aren’t new. They look used.”
Mr Johns said he counted the sex toys on Friday morning - and the number had decreased within 24 hours. “Yeah, some of the bigger ones are gone,” he said. Many of the devices are still lying outside the Osbeck Rd home - most crushed under the wheels of passing cars.
Locals have been puzzled by their sudden appearance and are trying to solve the curious case of the invading sex toys.
One theory is that it is an elaborate - and expensive - practical joke. Another school of thought is that they fell off the back of a delivery truck. Some said the sex toys could have been inside somebody’s rubbish bin, and fell onto the street on Thursday night when the garbage was collected.
Neighbour Camilla Cappa said the sex toys were a curious addition to the rural area. “There were all different kinds. Some were different colours. One was like a banana,” she said. “I had a child in the car. He just thought they were firecrackers.”
Within hours of the sex toys appearing, a resident replaced the street sign - changing it to “Dildo Boulevard”.
“I just cracked up. It was very entertaining,” Ms Cappa said.
“I don’t know where they came from. This is the strangest thing.”
Read the full story here…
Stiff response to sex toy mystery - Northern Territory News
Street renamed in sex-toy mystery | The Daily Telegraph
Just for your reference reading only…………..
Can “Circumcision” can curb HIV rates?
Alex Wodak | January 10, 2009 , Article from: The Australian
SHOULD Australia increase infant male circumcision now to control future HIV? The question is controversial, but the case for doing so is getting stronger.
The number of new HIV diagnoses in Australia increased each year from 718 in 1999, reaching 1051 new cases in 2006-07. As in all previous years since the HIV/AIDS epidemic was first recognised in the early 1980s, sex between males still accounts for the largest proportion of new cases. But the proportion of these cases has been slowly dropping in Australia and has now reached 64 per cent.
In contrast,
sex between men and women
, the second most numerous category since the 1980s, has been slowly increasing and reached 21 per cent in 2003-07. In most other developed countries, the proportion of new HIV cases attributed to sex between men and women has been growing steadily.
Reducing
the spread of HIV among nondrug-using men and women
around the world has been particularly difficult. Few have changed their sexual behaviour (including using condoms when having sex with casual partners).
Compelling evidence now shows that male
circumcision, surgical removal of the foreskin of the penis, can substantially reduce heterosexual HIV spread. However, the rate of “infant male circumcision” in Australia may be as low as 20 per cent.
Australia should start trying to increase the rate of infant male circumcision to reduce heterosexual HIV spread in future decades.
Soon after the HIV/AIDS epidemic was first recognised, researchers noted that
HIV was much more prevalent in African countries where male circumcision was uncommon
(such as Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana and Swaziland),
and much less prevalent in countries where male circumcision was common
(such as Madagascar, Senegal and Guinea). The same pattern was noted in
Asia
.
Combining the results of 38 studies (mostly from Africa),
circumcised men are less than half as likely to contract HIV as uncircumcised men
. Three trials carried out recently in South Africa, Kenya and Uganda collectively enrolled over 11,000 men who wanted to be circumcised. These men were randomised to remain uncircumcised for the duration of the study or were circumcised by doctors specially trained for the study.
All three studies were terminated early because such a large protective effect of circumcision was found that it was considered unethical to continue. These findings have been strengthened by the identification of several plausible biological mechanisms for greater HIV spread among uncircumcised males.
Circumcision removes Langerhans cells (which are specific targets for HIV) from the underside of the penis, promotes hardening of the skin of the penis, promotes more rapid drying of the penis after intercourse and reduces the likelihood of some sexually transmitted infections (which increase the likelihood of HIV being transmitted).
Male circumcision has many other benefits apart from reducing HIV. These benefits may include reducing some sexually transmitted infections (including syphilis, herpes simplex type 2 and chlamydia), urinary tract infections, penile cancer, prostate cancer and cervical cancer in female partners.
No serious complications were reported in any of the 5000 circumcised men in the three African studies. Complications were reported in only 0.2 per cent in major studies of infant male circumcision in developed countries.
How relevant are findings from developing countries with poorly controlled and predominantly heterosexual HIV epidemics to Australia, where HIV is relatively well controlled and dominated by spread of HIV among men who have sex with other men?
A recent Australian study of over 1400 men who have sex with men found that about one third exclusively practised insertive anal sex. In this sub-group, the chance of becoming HIV positive was about 85 per cent less among circumcised men. We should be cautious before recommending that gay men in Australia should be circumcised on the basis of only one study.
There are always possible risks, and a particular concern here would be ‘‘risk compensation’’ — that is, gay circumcised men feeling safer and thus abandoning condoms and other hard-won safer sex strategies. More research will be needed before circumcision can be recommended to adult gay men.
The situation with infant male circumcision is quite different. We have sufficient information now on both HIV and general grounds to amply justify revising the information provided to young parents about infant male circumcision.
Much of the information provided to parents today is quite biased. Young parents should be able to easily obtain objective information about the advantages and disadvantages of infant male circumcision.
State and territory departments of health should remove the current substantial obstacles to infant male circumcision in our public hospitals.
The Commonwealth Department of Health should revise the relevant Medicare items to reduce the current powerful financial disincentives to infant male circumcision.
We should aim to raise the rates of infant male circumcision to the levels which existed decades ago (while respecting the right of parents who do not wish to circumcise their infant sons).
Fortunately, the technology of infant male circumcision has improved considerably in recent decades. Acting now will only reduce HIV infections in decades to come. But our community should strongly endorse the objective of maintaining a low prevalence of HIV among Australians into the future.
Dr Alex Wodak is director of the Alcohol and Drug Service at St Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney
Reference:
Circumcision can curb HIV rates | The Australian
‘Talking’ parrot on TV boosts condom sales in India
Article from: The Associated Press
November 15, 2008
TELEVISION advertisements in India featuring a talking parrot and a puppy named Condom are helping increase condom sales in the country, health experts said. The ads are intended to change the way people see condoms in the country, which remains deeply conservative when it comes to sexual issues.
“We wanted people to talk about them like any other health product without the negative judgment,” said Yvonne MacPherson, India country director of BBC World Service Trust, which created the ad campaign and a now well-known ringtone that features singers chanting the word “condom” dozens of times.
The campaign has reached nearly 140 million adult men since the first ad was broadcast in early March and nearly 500,000 people have downloaded the ringtone to their mobile phones since it was launched in August, MacPherson said.
In the six months ending September 30, condom sales across India grew by more than 85 million - or five per cent - from the same period last year, said K. Sujatha Rao, head of India’s National AIDS Control Organisation.
Nearly 2.5 million people in India are infected with HIV, the AIDS virus, but talking about the disease and sexual health issues in general is still largely taboo.
Reference:
&squo;Talking&squo; parrot on TV boosts condom sales in India | The Courier-Mail
HIV man for trial over alleged unprotected sex
Posted Wed Mar 11, 2009 5:38pm AEDT
Updated 5 hours 25 minutes ago
A 41-year-old HIV-positive man will stand trial on eight counts of endangering life by having unprotected sex (ABC News: Gary Rivett)
Map: Adelaide 5000
The Adelaide Magistrates Court has committed a HIV-positive man to stand trial on eight counts of endangering life by having unprotected sex.
Stuart McDonald, 41, will also face one count of rape, one of threatening to kill, and one of assault when arraigned in the Supreme Court next month.
McDonald told the court he would plead not guilty to all of the charges.
The alleged offences are said to have occurred between 2001 and 2006.
HIV man for trial over alleged unprotected sex - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
Perth psychiatrist, 80,
jailed for sex with patients
Perth psychiatrist, 80, jailed for sex with patients | PerthNow
Todd Cardy, court reporter, March 12, 2009
A RETIRED 80-year-old WA psychiatrist who admitted carrying out “sex therapy” with two patients 30 years ago has been jailed for 10 years.
A Perth Supreme Court jury found
Alan John Stubley, now 80, guilty of 10 sex charges including six counts of rape against the women
last November.
The women tearfully told the jury Stubley had sex with them over a number of years in the 1970s after they approached him for therapy at his West Perth offices.
Stubley pleaded not guilty to 14 sex charges over the encounters arguing at the trial that the sex was consensual and part of a program of sexual therapy.
But Justice Narelle Johnson today rejected Stubley’s defence saying that his testimony was “nothing more than a poor excuse for having sex with his patients”.
Justice Johnson said while the sex had not been physically forced on the women the two victims were vulnerable and came to him to help them with their lives.
The court heard on one occasion Stubley had sex with a woman who was due to have a baby in four weeks and then visited her in hospital after the baby was born saying that she had to organise another appointment.
The court heard Stubley had later realised that sex therapy was immoral and unethical but Justice Johnson said that Stubley had never expressed remorse for his actions and had lied to medical authorities after the women complained about their treatments.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
ANOTHER CASE:
East County sex offender, 81, returned to state hospital
By Dana Littlefield (Contact) Union-Tribune Staff Writer
6:14 p.m. March 11, 2009
SAN DIEGO – An elderly sex offender who was allowed to live under supervision in rural East County was ordered Wednesday to return to a state hospital because he broke several rules of his release.
John David Norman, 81, had been living in the community of Boulevard until his Feb. 2 arrest. Among other violations, he was accused of passing a note to a 19-year-old bagging clerk at an El Centro grocery store, then failing to notify authorities responsible for monitoring
READ MORE……….
East County sex offender, 81, returned to state hospital
Blowjobs and Pussy Licking’s sex linked to throat cancer
Scientists looked at tissue samples from patients
A virus contracted through oral sex is the cause of some throat cancers, say US scientists.
HPV infection was found to be a much stronger risk factor than tobacco or alcohol use, the Johns Hopkins University study of 300 people found.
The New England Journal of Medicine study said the risk was almost nine times higher for people who reported oral sex with more than six partners.
But experts said a larger study was needed to confirm the findings.
HPV infection is the cause of the majority of cervical cancers, and 80% of sexually active women can expect to have an HPV infection at some point in their lives.
It is important for health care providers to know that people without the traditional risk factors of tobacco and alcohol use can nevertheless be at risk of oropharyngeal cancer
Dr Gypsyamber D’Souza, study author
The Johns Hopkins study took blood and saliva from 100 men and women newly diagnosed with oropharyngeal cancer which affects the throat, tonsils and back of the tongue.
They also asked questions about sex practices and other risk factors for the disease, such as family history.
Those who had evidence of prior oral HPV infection had a 32-fold increased risk of throat cancer.
HPV16 - one of the most common cancer-causing strains of the virus - was present in the tumours of 72% of cancer patients in the study.
Risk factors
There was no added risk for people infected with HPV who also smoked and drank alcohol, suggesting the virus itself is driving the risk of the cancer.
Oral sex was said to be the main mode of transmission of HPV but the researchers said mouth-to-mouth transmission, for example through kissing, could not be ruled out.
Most HPV infections clear with little or no symptoms but a small percentage of people who acquired high-risk strains may develop a cancer, the researchers added.
Study author Dr Gypsyamber D’Souza said: “It is important for health care providers to know that people without the traditional risk factors of tobacco and alcohol use can nevertheless be at risk of oropharyngeal cancer.”
Co-researcher Dr Maura Gillison said previous research by the team had suggested there was a strong link.
But she added: “People should be reassured that oropharyngeal cancer is relatively uncommon and the overwhelming majority of people with an oral HPV infection probably will not get throat cancer.”
A vaccine which protects against cervical cancer caused by HPV strains 6, 11, 16 and 18, and also against genital warts is available and the researchers said the study provided a rationale for vaccinating both girls and boys.
But whether the vaccine would protect against oral HPV infection is not yet known.
Dr Julie Sharp, science information officer at Cancer Research UK, said: “There is conflicting evidence about the role of HPV, and this rare type of mouth cancer.
“As this was a small study, further research is needed to confirm these observations.”
“We know that after age, the main causes of mouth cancer are smoking or chewing tobacco or betel nut, and drinking too much alcohol.”
Ref:
BBC NEWS | Health | Oral sex linked to throat cancer
7 April 2009
Spray for ‘six times longer’ sex
Premature ejaculation can be distressing for couples
A spray can help men with premature ejaculation problems prolong the length of time they have sex by six times.
Men who used the treatment five minutes before having intercourse extended their love-making from half a minute to almost four minutes, trials showed.
The spray, developed at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast, contains local anaesthetics that numb the penis.
A British Journal of Urology International study says it could be available in the next couple of years.
Up to 40% of men experience premature ejaculation at some time in their lives, experts estimate.
It improved both sexual performance and sexual satisfaction
Lead researcher Professor Wallace Dinsmore
It is difficult to have an exact idea of the rate because there is still embarrassment about discussing sex lives and the definition of what constitutes a premature climax does vary.
For some 10 minutes in the sack may be enough, but for others intercourse lasting less than 20 minutes may be unsatisfactory.
In the study, the researchers looked at 300 men who regularly had difficulty lasting for more than a minute during love-making.
Most of the men had tried other treatments before, the most common being oral antidepressants.
Every time they had intercourse during the three-month study period, each couple measured the time to ejaculation with a stopwatch.
Sex delay
The men who tested
the spray, called PSD502, were able to last 6.3 times longer on average
.
In comparison, men who tested a “dummy” spray containing no drug lasted only 1.7 times longer. There are treatments and training techniques that can help. Peter Baker of the Men’s Health Forum PSD502 helped 90% of the men enjoy sex for up to
four minutes
, where they had previously only lasted for seconds.
And there was minimal transfer of the spray to the partners, meaning the men did not have to use a condom for this reason alone.
Lead researcher Professor Wallace Dinsmore said: "
Premature ejaculation
can be a very distressing condition for men and can cause distress, frustration and make them avoid sexual intimacy.
“Our study shows that when
the PSD502 spray was applied to the man’s penis five minutes before intercourse
it improved both sexual performance and sexual satisfaction, which are key factors in treating premature ejaculation.”
Peter Baker of the Men’s Health Forum said the findings were welcomed.
“Premature ejaculation is a very significant problem for lots of men that is hardly talked about and that needs to change.
“There are treatments and training techniques that can help. It is important that new treatments are looked at and that men are encouraged to seek help.”
Paula Hall, a counsellor for Relate, said: “This might particularly help men who have problems with premature ejaculation related to anxiety.
“It could help build their confidence, although the root cause of the anxiety would still need addressing.”
BBC NEWS | Health | Spray for ‘six times longer’ sex
Quote:
Originally Posted by
lls8
7 April 2009
[
BBC NEWS | Health | Spray for ‘six times longer’ sex
Sounds like indian oil