Prostitute's HIV-Related Charge Dropped in Plea Bargain
Experts: HIV Studies Needed Along Arizona-Mexico Border
Monitoring Indicates Safe-Sex Relapse in Boston
HIV Prevention Programs Failing; New Infections on the Increase
HIV Prevention Groups Say Bush Administration Is Targeting Their Work
AIDS Doctors, Activists Discouraged by Bush Stance on AIDS Programs
Rise in Iranian Prostitution Blamed on Strict Sex Rules, Economy
Appeal from Mahila Samanwaya Committee
EUROPAP: Promoting the health and wellbeing of sex workers in Europe
Queen’s AIDS project gets $3 million from U.K.
Gay Sheep May Help Explain Biology of Homosexuals
Scotland Breaks Ranks Over Payouts for Hepatitis C Patients
Prostitute's
HIV-Related Charge Dropped in Plea Bargain
Los Angeles Times (13.09.02):John
L. Mitchell
In
a last-minute plea bargain, prosecutors dropped charges against a woman who
is HIV-positive and accused of engaging in prostitution. Panchita Hall, 46,
was facing a second trial under a 1988 law that requires prostitutes who are
HIV-positive and who have been informed of their blood test results to be
charged with a felony upon their second arrest. She has been convicted of
prostitution six times since she learned in 1995 that she is HIV-positive.
Hall was arrested by an undercover officer in April. The jury in her first
trial deadlocked, and an impasse was declared.
Deputy
District Attorney Lori-Ann Jones, who tried the initial case, said the decision
not to seek a second trial was made because "there was no assurance that
another jury was going to reach a guilty verdict." Conviction under the
1988 statute carries a three-year sentence, but Jones had planned to ask for
an enhanced sentence of as much as nine years for Hall. On Thursday in Compton
Superior Court, Hall was sentenced instead to four years in prison for violating
probation on a 2001 prostitution conviction. Jones said that with time served,
Hall probably would be free in a year.
The
law was first invoked in Los Angeles County in 1990 against a male prostitute
who was sentenced to two years in state prison. Tens of thousands of prostitutes
have been tested for HIV in the county as a result of the law. Slightly more
than 200 have been convicted on a felony charge since 1995, police said.
Back to top
Experts:
HIV Studies Needed Along Arizona-Mexico Border
Associated Press (17.09.02)
Poverty-forced
prostitution among Hispanic men along the Arizona-Mexico border should be
studied to see if the practice is driving up HIV infection, experts said last
week at a bi-national conference on HIV/AIDS. "When these men who are
traveling from Latin American and other countries end up at the border without
anything, they see little options but to prostitute themselves," said
Juan Bazan, director of the Bi-National AIDS Advocacy Project. "They
will do whatever they have to to live. They don't see another option,"
Bazan said. "Many feel all alone, and when they enter prostitution, they
also enter a circle of drugs and alcohol."
Besides
drinking and taking drugs, the dangers are compounded because these men are
not telling their wives or girlfriends what they have done - putting their
mates at high risk of HIV/AIDS, said Juan Ruiz, of California's Department
of Health Services. The findings are part of a three-year study that Ruiz
released at the conference in Tucson, Ariz. "I don't think we know enough
about the prevalence of HIV/AIDS along the border," said Sally Stevens,
a research professor with the University of Arizona Southwest Institute for
Research on Women.
The CDC estimates that 850,000 to 950,000 US residents have HIV, and one-quarter of them are unaware of their infection. In Mexico since 1983, there have been 52,000 reported AIDS cases, and of the patients afflicted, 20,000 are alive, said Carlos Magis, of the National Center for the Prevention and Control of AIDS in Mexico. In southern Arizona, El Rio Community Health Center is treating 1,350 clients for HIV/AIDS and expects a 15 percent increase in new patients by December, said Jane Chittick, CEO of the El Rio Foundation, the fundraising arm for the health center. "We are seeing five new patients each week at the health center for HIV/AIDS, and two of the five are women," Chittick said
Back
to top
Monitoring
Indicates Safe-Sex Relapse in Boston
AIDS Alert (01.09.02)
The
trend of men who have sex with men (MSM) resorting to increasingly unsafe
sexual practices is becoming apparent throughout the developed world, as studies
continue to highlight increases in the prevalence of STDs. Studies presented
at the 14th International AIDS Conference in Barcelona showed increasing STDs
among MSM in New England's largest MSM clinical care site and at Paris STD
clinics.
Fenway
Community Health in Boston has charted STD trends among gay men and lesbians
in New England for three decades. The clinic's records showed that the lowest
prevalence rate in STDs occurred in the late 1980s and early 1990s, after
AIDS deaths had become a strong motivating factor in safe sex practices. Gonorrhea
cases had reached a nadir of 43 and there were no syphilis cases at Fenway
in 1994. "Now that rate has started going back up," said Kenneth
H. Mayer, MD, medical research director at Fenway.
"The number of STDs tripled between 1994 and 2000," Mayer said.
By 2000, there were 113 patients diagnosed with gonorrhea and 10 with syphilis.
Of these patients, 75 percent presented with no symptoms, and 10 percent had
been notified by sexual partners. Earlier studies have highlighted similar
trends in San Francisco, which also has some data showing increases in HIV
infection rates among MSM.
The
trend, however, is not limited to the United States. Paris experienced a sharp
increase in syphilis cases between 1998 and 2001, according to another study
presented in Barcelona. In 1998, there were four syphilis cases reported in
Paris STD clinics; in 2001, there were 91 cases reported. Prior to the late
1990s, syphilis had been a rare disease in Paris, and its resurgence is consistent
with evidence that gonorrhea cases also are increasing, especially among MSM.
"Therapeutic optimism is part of the equation," Mayer said. While
MSM in their 40s and 50s have lived through a time when their friends became
sick and many died from AIDS, the younger MSM have grown up with AIDS as a
fact of life and have not necessarily personally been affected by it, Mayer
said. Although data collected on HIV infection at Fenway are not precise enough
to measure HIV prevalence rates over time, there is an increased likelihood
that HIV rates have gone up in New England among MSM, just as they have in
San Francisco, Mayer added.
Back to top
HIV
Prevention Programs Failing; New Infections on the Increase
Canadian Press (04.09.02):Dene
Moore
In
2001, British Columbia had a modest but alarming increase in new HIV infections
among both the gay and heterosexual populations - the first increase in six
years - AIDS activists said Wednesday. The rate of HIV infection in the province
declined annually to 413 new infections in 2000 from 840 in 1994. But in 2001
that number increased to 440. A recent Health Canada report found a similar
increase among Toronto's gay population last year. Montreal was the only city
studied that did not see the same rise in new infections, although researchers
are unsure if that means the city has really bucked the trend that is also
seen in the United States, Australia and the Netherlands.
"Despite 20 years of working to stop the spread of HIV, we find that
those efforts are falling considerably short," said Glen Hillson, chairperson
of the BC Persons with AIDS Society. New drug treatments mean more people
with AIDS are living longer. That means more of the AIDS funding in Canada
goes to caring for those who are infected and less goes to prevention programs,
said Hillson. In smaller communities, HIV/AIDS still carries a stigma. "Homophobia
prevents prevention posters from being put in public places," said Rich
Marchand, a researcher with the Community Based Research Center. Needle exchange
programs are the biggest investment in prevention in British Columbia, Marchand
said.
Women
account for 25 percent of new HIV infections in 2000, Health Canada statistics
show. "Yet in the heterosexual community, it's not even on the map,"
said Marchand. There are an estimated 15,000 Canadians infected with HIV who
do not know it, according to Health Canada. Stephen James, a researcher for
the group, said men who have sex with men account for 77.9 percent of cumulative
AIDS cases among adult men in Canada and 71.3 percent of HIV-positive reports
since testing began in 1985. "Although gay men continue to have the highest
number of new infections, few prevention programs exist for gay men,"
Marchand said.
Back to top
HIV
Prevention Groups Say Bush Administration Is Targeting Their Work
Associated Press (01.10.02):Laura
Meckler
The
Bush administration has pulled information about the effectiveness of condoms
from a government Web site and is engaged in a "witch hunt" against
those who promote condoms to fight AIDS, several groups charge. They argue
that the administration is hostile to HIV prevention and sex education that
is not based on abstinence-only, which discourages all sex before marriage
and bars discussion of the benefits of birth control and condom use.
The
advocacy groups said Monday they are particularly concerned about federal
agency audits, now underway, to examine the finances and programming of AIDS
groups. "It's a campaign to censor science and research, and it's a campaign
to use government auditors to intimidate opponents of the administration on
key policy issues," said James Wagoner, president of Advocates for Youth,
a group that promotes education about birth control and condom use. The administration
says it is simply making sure that tax dollars are properly spent. Health
and Human Services Deputy Secretary Claude Allen called any suggestion of
a witch hunt laughable.
Advocates
point to a series of actions in the last year:*Information explaining the
effectiveness of condoms in preventing HIV transmission has been pulled from
the CDC Web site. Also gone is a section called "Programs that Work,"
which focused on HIV and highlighted several proven programs that involve
condom use.
*A
broad review of HHS AIDS spending, ordered by Secretary Tommy Thompson, is
underway and includes grants to outside groups. Allen said he knew of no other
HHS-funded programs undergoing similar scrutiny.
*The HHS inspector general is investigating at least eight AIDS programs to
see if their content is too sexually explicit or promotes sexual activity.
*Members of Congress also have twice asked HHS to further investigate AIDS
groups.
"There is a fear out in the community that if they produce something
or say something inappropriate, or what is deemed as inappropriate, they will
lose their funding," said Mary Ann Green of Florida AIDS Action.
AIDS Doctors, Activists Discouraged by Bush
Stance on AIDS Programs
Orange County Register (20.09.02):Mayrav Saar
On Thursday
at the US Conference on AIDS in Anaheim, Calif., White House Office of National
AIDS Policy Director Dr. Joseph O'Neill was booed and jeered as he spoke of
President Bush's stance on AIDS prevention programs. The national gathering
of doctors, social workers, patients and advocates seemed discouraged to hear
O'Neill discuss Bush's policies in support of abstinence education and against
federal funding for needle exchange programs.
"I
know there are concerns in this room about the administration's policies,
or what our policies are imagined to be," said O'Neill, who began treating
AIDS patients as a San Francisco internist in 1982. "We have to try to
bring more voices to the table. Abstinence is one of those voices," he
said. "We have not made a dent in the annual number of new infections
in years. And we cannot afford to close our ears to any ideas."
Local AIDS
health care workers criticized Bush's policies as shortsighted and potentially
dangerous. O'Neill said Bush's stance does not exclude safe sex education.
But Dan Gleason, executive director of the AIDS Services Foundation, Orange
County, said programs heavy in abstinence education have failed to ensure
that young people use protection when they do become sexually active. "It's
not an enlightened perspective," Gleason said. "It's a perspective
that doesn't take good solid health education into account."
AIDS health
care providers are also concerned that the administration is not committed
to increasing funding for prevention programs. Prevention efforts in Orange
County have been particularly difficult in Latino and African-American communities,
Gleason said.
O'Neill
received the biggest jeers when he discussed the administration's lack of
support for federal dollars for needle exchange programs. "When they
talk about not wanting to fund needle exchange programs, the government is
not really thinking about future generations," said Neil Willenson, founder
and CEO of Camp Heartland, a national summer camp program for children affected
by HIV/AIDS.
Back to top
Rise in Iranian Prostitution Blamed on Strict
Sex Rules, Economy
Associated Press (15.09.02):Ali Akbar Dareini
A recent
serial killer in Iran was understood by some to be battling corruption and
a social scourge - prostitution. Saeed Hanaei went to the gallows for murdering
prostitutes. "If I removed corruption, it was for the good of the people,"
his gravestone read. Hanged for killing 16 women, many view him as a hero.
Official
statistics in Iran suggest prostitution is increasing in the Islamic Republic.
"Based on our findings, the number of prostitutes is unfortunately on
the rise. There are now an estimated 30,000 working prostitutes in Iran,"
said Hadi Motamedi, a top official at the State Welfare Organization.
Motamedi
could not say how much prostitution has increased, but women waiting on customers
in the streets are more numerous than in past years. Prostitutes are believed
to work independently, though police have reported organized rings mostly
by women in private homes.
Iran's
strict Islamic rules allow little socializing between the sexes, and young
Iranians have been jailed and flogged for dancing together at birthday parties.
"Parents who are suspicious of their children, don't give their children
any choice or freedom, and always impose their thinking on them, force such
children to flee homes," said Hamzeh Ganji. Ganji said young girls who
leave home often must become prostitutes to survive.
More than
half of Iran's 70 million people are below age 25. The unemployment rate is
officially 15 percent, but private experts say it really is about 30 percent.
One psychiatrist, Mahdis Kamkar thinks that the rise in prostitution is a
symptom of broader social problems such as "troubled families, divorce,
identity crises and social contradictions."
Ganji argues
that allowing brothels to be legalized and run by Islamic rules would enable
the authorities to control AIDS and other STDs, "and the rest of the
society will live in peace without women afraid of being molested or wrongly
approached by customers in the streets." But many clerics scoff at the
idea that Islam could ever condone sex outside marriage.
Meanwhile,
his family and others defend Hanaei, the serial killer. "I'm not sad
that my dad is dead. I'm sad because he failed to achieve his goal,"
his 16-year-old son, Ali, told the Associated Press. Not everyone is happy
with that response, including the government.
Appeal from Mahila Samanwaya Committee
The time: 11 p.m., 29 August 2002. The place: Tollygunj,
a red-light area in Kolkata. The incident: Local mastans (anti-socials), who
masquerade as the neighbourhood big brothers, severely beat up Rekha Lodh,
a sex worker. They said she needed to be punished for having had a public
altercation with her current husband. In the middle of the night Rekha and
her two young children are thrown out of her room and locked out. The reason
– she needed to be taught a further
lesson, the beating alone was not enough.
Shapna Gayen, also a local sex worker, and the President of Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee, a sex workers’ collective, vehemently protests. With hersupport Rekha dares to lodge a complaint with the police. DMSC too lodges a first incident report. The police take no action against the perpetrators.
The bigwigs of the neighbourhood, who live off the earnings of sex workers through extortion and running various other rackets in the locality retaliates by launching a hate campaign against Shapna. How dared she bring in outsiders, the police, to settle the neighbourhood dispute? She is persistently intimidated, abused and harassed. When Shapna refuses to be cowered and continues to protest, her husband, who works as a vendor in a shop run by one of the leading mastans, is summarily sacked from his job to teach Shapna a lesson.
The STD clinic run by DMSC as part of their HIV prevention programme in area is closed down.
So what is new? Sex workers are after all routinely subjected to violence and human rights abuse all around India and rarely do the administration intervene in their favour. But this incident has a wider significance. For the last ten years, sex workers of Kolkata have been organising themselves to protect their rights and end their exploitation, and had also been in the forefront of an extremely effective HIV prevention programme across West Bengal under the leadership of DMSC. This was no isolated incident against individual sex workers. This was a premeditated act to undermine this
movement, and strike at the heart of its leadership. As marginalised and exploited people come together and attempt to take control of their lives, those whose interests are vested in their subordination have to hit back.
On 06 October, two days after the DMSC clinic was reopened in response to local demand, Shapna Gayen’s house was encircled by the same mastans who felt that she and DMSC were a serious threat to their control over the locality. Anticipating violence Shapna summoned police help. While four policemen from the local police station were escorting her out of the area at her insistence, Shapna was dragged away by the mastans and publicly beaten up. While she was held back by her hair by some, the others took their turn to kick and punch her. She is now in hospital. Some of her comrades in DMSC who rushed to the area on hearing about the incident were also beaten up. While Shapna was being beaten the policemen simply looked on. Rekha has been told by the mastans that she will be taken care of once Shapna has been sorted out and put to rest. And the police have refused to accept a first incident report this time. And of course the criminals are running free. No, one person has been arrested and produced in court – though not one of the criminals,but Shapna’s husband, Dilip, who had tried to protecther.
Friends, the constitution of our state guarantees equal right and security to all its citizens, irrespective of the class, gender or occupation. The state takes special responsibility towards guaranteeing and promoting the rights of those who have been historically exploited and marginalised. Our public administration is charged to uphold the constitution and law of the land without fear or favour. So why is the police so reluctant to intervene? Why do the Tollygunj mastans, who are known criminals with police records so sure of their immunity from law that they persist in persecuting Shapna? Is it because she is a woman, an under-class, and a sex worker? Or has it more to do with the fact that she the President of DMSC – the largest ever sexworkers’ organisation, which is challenging the verybasis of persisting inequalities and violence on the basis of class, gender and sexuality?
We appeal to you to act as individuals or on behalf of your organisation now and write to the Chief Minister of West Bengal, the state Home Ministry, the Human Rights Commission and the National Commission for Women, demanding justice. If we do not protest and act now, once again we will be party to the increasing on the democratic basis of our country.
Yours in solidarity,
Angura Begum
Secretary, DMSC
EUROPAP: Promoting the health and wellbeing of sex workers in Europe
Sexually transmitted infections (STI) are an occupational risk for people who sell sex, but most are very keen to keep themselves and their partners safe. Many people believe that sex workers have a high risk of and play an important role in transmission of STIs. Research in Europe over the past two decades has been important in countering this belief (1-3). Studies consistently show a high rate of condom use in commercial sex, and relatively low risks of HIV and other STI for women sex workers (2,3). A survey of 945 women sex workers in nine European cities in 1990-1 found an overall HIV-1 prevalence of 5.3%, associated with sharing injecting equipment, coming from a high prevalence area, and use of incompatible lubricants during sex. Women who did not inject drugs had a prevalence of 1.5% (1). Two cohort studies in Europe have shown a relatively low incidence of HIV infection (0.2 and 0.9 cases per 100 person years respectively in the United Kingdom and Spain) (2,4). Higher risks have been found in more stigmatised sex workers, including men who sell sex, transgenders, and injecting drug users (5,6).
In 1993 EUROPAP ( http://www.europap.net/ ), the European Network for HIV/STD Prevention in Prostitution, was created to promote the health and wellbeing of sex workers in Europe. This network facilitates the sharing of experience and good practice, assesses the health impacts of different policies on prostitution, and produces training materials. EUROPAP is funded in part by the European Commission, and has representatives in 18 European countries with links to over 400 projects. Earlier this year a successful conference with 180 participants from 39 countries was held (7). EUROPAP works closely with sex worker organisations, as they have a key role to play in advocacy and promoting health through challenging abuse and exploitation.
Over the past decade major social changes have had an impact on prostitution, and EUROPAP has documented these changes and made recommendations to maintain the health of sex workers. For example, increasing mobility has transformed sex work in many European cities. A recent survey has shown that the proportion of migrant workers has increased from 24% in 1990-1 to 56% in 2001 (8). Many migrant workers spend relatively short times in each city, creating challenges for preventive healthcare and management. Together with the TAMPEP (Transnational AIDS/STD Prevention among Migrant Prostitutes in Europe Project) network, EUROPAP has produced Hustling for Health , a manual with advice on best practice in health promotion and healthcare delivery (9). This manual is now available in ten languages, including Russian. Outreach was found to be useful both for reaching sex workers with health promotion messages, and in some situations for directly delivering services such as hepatitis B vaccination (10).
Many European governments have reformed their policies on prostitution in recent years, creating additional challenges. Changes range from legalisation of sex work businesses in the Netherlands to the criminalisation of the buying of sexual services in Sweden. Counter-intuitively, both these reforms appear to have created new obstacles to health promotion and healthcare delivery to the most vulnerable sex workers by making them more hidden. Other governments are looking at reintroducing the registration and mandatory screening of sex workers. This approach is strongly opposed by EUROPAP. Evidence from Greece and Austria, where registration still exists, for example, shows that only a minority of sex workers are in the registered sector, and those who are outside it have little or no access to care, thereby increasing their risks of health problems. Those who are registered are subjected to treatments considered by EUROPAP to be an abuse of human rights, namely having no right to consent to examination and treatments.
A EUROPAP training video for sex workers on tips for safer working is available to healthcare professionals working in this area. A report and video/DVD of the recent EUROPAP conference, Hustling for Health, and a statement on policy are also available. By the end of the current programme (August 2003) EUROPAP will have evidence based guidelines on healthcare and health promotion, a policy resource pack, a searchable database on the internet, and an updated report on health of sex workers from ten countries. Links with European Union applicant countries are being developed, in order to continue the sharing of expertise and good practice. All materials are available from the coordinating centre ( europap@ic.ac.uk ).
References :
1. Alary M. HIV infection in European female sex workers: epidemiological link with use of petroleum-based lubricants. European Working Group on HIV Infection in Female Prostitutes. AIDS 1993; 7 : 401-8.
2. Ward H, Day S, Weber J. Risky business: health and safety in the sex industry over a 9 year period. Sex Transm Infect 1999; 75 : 340-3.
3. Mak R, Plum J, Van Renterghem L. Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection, sexually transmitted diseases and HIV-antibody testing practices in Belgian prostitutes. Genitourin Med 1990; 66:337-41.
4. Vioque J, Hernandez-Aguado I, Fernandez Garcia E, Garcia de la Hera M, Alvarez-Dardet C. Prospective cohort study of female sex workers and the risk of HIV infection in Alicante, Spain (1986-96). Sex Transm Infect 1998; 74 : 284-8.
5.Spizzichino L, Zaccarelli M, Rezza G, Ippolito G, Antinori A, Gattari P. HIV infection among foreign transsexual sex workers in Rome: prevalence, behavior patterns, and seroconversion rates. Sex Transm Dis 2001; 28 : 405-11.
6.Belza MJ, Llacer A, Mora R, Morales M, Castilla J, de la Fuente L. Sociodemographic characteristics and HIV risk behaviour patterns of male sex workers in Madrid, Spain. AIDS Care 2001; 13 : 677-82.
7. EUROPAP. Sex work and health in a changing Europe, 18 – 20 January 2002, Milton Keynes, UK. Organisers’ report ( http://www.europap.net/conference%20reports/organisersreport.html ).
8. Ward H. European perspectives on sex work, migration and health (SS6). Int J STD and AIDS 2002; 13 (supp 1): 5-6.
9. European Network for HIV/STD Prevention in Prostitution. Hustling for Health: developing services for sex workers in Europe. Imperial College London, England; 1999. [available in 10 languages]
10. Mak R, Ven D, Traen A, Claeyssens M, Van Renterghem L, Leroux-Roels G, et al. Hepatitis B vaccination for sex workers: do outreach programmes perform better? Sex Transm Infect. In press 2002.
Reported by Helen Ward ( h.ward@ic.ac.uk ), EUROPAP Coordinator, Clinical Senior Lecturer, Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Imperial College London, England, and Rudolf Mak ( rudolf.mak@rug.ac.be ), EUROPAP Steering Committee, Staff member, Department of Public Health, Gent University, Belgium.
Queen’s AIDS project gets $3 million from U.K.
By Jennifer Pritchett Thursday, October 31, 2002
In an unprecedented move, the British government has donated $3 million to a Queen’s University AIDS research group.
Britain’s Department for International Development is giving the money to the Queen’s Southern African Research Centre’s flagship program, the Southern African Migration Project, over a period of three years.
Researchers are trying to determine why 14 of the top 20 AIDS-stricken countries in the world are in southern Africa. In fact, 70 per cent of the 36 million people infected worldwide with HIV live in sub-Saharan Africa. And the eight countries with the highest rates of HIV infection are in southern Africa. Botswana is first with 43 per cent infected with AIDS, followed by South Africa with an infection rate of 32.5 per cent.
Project director Jonathan Crush said yesterday the donation is generous and most unexpected. “They approached us – it was unsolicited,” he said.
The program, which looks at how AIDS is spreading faster among people who move around a lot, is gaining an international reputation for doing good work in South Africa, said Crush.
“That means that other funders have become interested,” he said. “People out there are seeing the impact of our work.”
And that work – increasing what people know about people in South Africa – can help universities, research institutes and government departments in Botswana, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland and Zimbabwe devise a solution to the problem.
“It’s to help devise interventions that are sensitive to people’s mobility,” he said.
A recently published paper, co-authored by Crush, points to the importance of the migration issue in explaining the HIV/AIDS epidemic and finding ways to slow its spread.
“Unless the issues of migration and disease are understood and dealt with effectively, it is unlikely that the greater struggle to control and manage AIDS can be won,” he said.
In fact, Crush, who lived in South Africa for three years when the program was just starting in 1996, is returning there next week to meet with governments to discuss AIDS.
Crush is thrilled with the British donation. He said it will double the program’s annual operating budget, which currently receives $1 million from the Canadian International Development Agency.
“It’s a tremendous endorsement and a significant injection of funding,” he said.
Crush said the money will be used to expand the scope of the project and to develop new partnerships with university groups in Malawi, Zambia and Tanzania.
Current partners include the International Organization for Migration in Geneva and the
Ottawa-led International Metropolis Project.
Gay Sheep May Help Explain Biology of Homosexuals
Reuters (04.11.02)
Gay sheep that mate only with other rams have different brain structures from "straight" sheep, a finding that may shed light on human sexuality, US researchers said on Monday.
The differences are similar to those seen in some homosexual humans, but probably only go a small way to explaining the causes of different sexual preferences, the team at Oregon Health & Science University said.
"We are not trying to explain human sexuality by this study," Charles Roselli, a professor of physiology and pharmacology who led the study, said in a telephone interview. "Whether this is a big component of what contributes in humans, that's still debatable."
Working with a team at the US Department of Agriculture's Sheep Experiment Station in Dubois, Idaho, Roselli's team studied 27 sheep--10 ewes, nine rams that mated only with other rams and eight rams that mated only with females.
The "gay" sheep are strongly homosexual, Roselli said.
"They don't pair-bond," he said. "But they are exclusive. They don't court or mate with females. They only court and mate with males."
First the scientists watched the sheep to be sure of their behavior--something that cannot be done with humans. Then they took apart their brains.
"There had been reports in humans that a certain area of the hypothalamus, the preoptic area ... was usually larger in males than females," Roselli said. This area was also found to be larger in heterosexual humans than in homosexual men.
But the researchers had used the brains of men who had died of AIDS in their study, which meant the disease or drugs used to treat it could have had an effect on the brain.
"With an animal model you can be more selective and do more controlled studies," Roselli said.
The sheep had similar differences in their brains, the researchers told a meeting in Orlando, Florida, of the Society for Neuroscience.
"In a sense we confirmed what's been found in humans," Roselli said.
The brain cells in this area also made greater amounts of an enzyme called aromatase in the heterosexual rams. Aromatase is involved in the action of testosterone, the so-called male hormone.
This does not mean the gay rams had less testosterone in their brains, Roselli stressed. "It is not necessarily the activational effect of the hormone," he said. Other types of neurons are probably active--they just have not been identified yet.
No differences in testosterone relating to sexuality have been found either in the sheep or in humans, he said.
"It's not that gay men have lower levels of testosterone," he said. "And it's not the case with these sheep."
Roselli believes that exposure to hormones while still in the mother's womb may affect the brain and cause differences in sexual preference, and more experiments will aim to show whether this is true.
AIDS is reducing Zimbabwe’s agricultural labour force by about 10% a year, the United Nations estimated. It forecasts that the disease will shrink the Zimbabwean agricultural workforce by 22.7% in 2020.
Scotland Breaks Ranks Over Payouts for Hepatitis C Patients
Haemophiliacs in England and Wales infected with the liver-damaging hepatitis C virus through tainted blood transfusions had no case for NHS compensation, the government has said, after it appeared that those in Scotland would receive payouts. The Scottish executive’s health minister, Malcolm Chisholm, welcomed a report recommending that a fund be set up immediately for those with hepatitis C who could prove they had been given infected blood or blood products by the health service.
 | home |
| contact us |
| visiting the WMP |
| symptoms |
| law |
| working safety |
| HIV and AIDS |
| condoms |
| news |
| acknowledgements |
| links |