Rise of Internet Fuels Fears of AIDS Resurgence

[Liberal Veteran]

ATLANTA (Reuters) - A growing number of gay and bisexual men in the United States are engaging in risky sex with partners they meet on the Internet, raising fears that the AIDS virus could be poised for a major comeback in the group hardest hit by the epidemic.

Online chatrooms and Web sites are replacing gay bathhouses and sex clubs as the most popular meeting point to arrange high-risk sex, according to two new studies presented on Tuesday at the 2003 National HIV Prevention Conference.

The findings come amid growing evidence of an apparent resurgence of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, as well as syphilis in men who have sex with men. The presence of sexually transmitted diseases is known to facilitate the spread of HIV.

New HIV diagnoses among gay and bisexual men have jumped more than 17 percent since 1999, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported this week. Some 850,000 to 950,000 Americans have the AIDS virus and approximately 16,000 die from the disease each year.


More....

http://reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=internetNews&storyID=3179188


This seems like a bit of a stretch to me, folks. Smart enough to use the internet, but not smart enough to know about HIV and safer sex?

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

1. Is it me, or...

Do I detect some very flimsy logic in this report. Looks to me like 1+1!=2 in this report and it is just attempt for someone to tar two things he/she doesn't like with a very wide brush of <shiver> immorality.</sarcasm>

[Loonman]

2. Silly Article

Scapegoating. Wrap that rascal, dammit!

[rocktivity]

3. Most of the sex clubs have been closed--should the Internet be, too?

New HIV diagnoses among gay and bisexual men have jumped more than 17 percent since 1999, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported this week...

Online chatrooms and Web sites are replacing gay bathhouses and sex clubs as the most popular meeting point to arrange high-risk sex, according to two new studies presented on Tuesday at the 2003 National HIV Prevention Conference.

Maybe the infection rate is rising because AIDS has faded from the public imagination. More public awareness and education would slow the rate faster than less sex, and possiblly even lead to it.

rocknation