Tag Archives: HIV/AIDS

Mandatory condom use by porn performers is already the law in Los Angeles County and the issue will be put to voters statewide in November thanks to a ballot initiative sponsored by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation. However yesterday state OSHA officials declined to beat voters to the punch. From the Los Angeles Times: The state Division of Occupational Safety and …

The Washington Post reports: Johns Hopkins announced this week that it had received approval from the nation’s organ-sharing authority to become the first hospital in the United States to conduct transplants involving HIV-positive donors and HIV-positive recipients. “This is an unbelievably exciting day for our hospital and our team, but more importantly for patients living with HIV and end-stage organ …

Fulton County, Georgia – whose county seat is Atlanta – has launched a no-cost PrEP clinic in collaboration with Gilead, the maker of Truvada. Matt Hennie reports at Project Q Atlanta: Fulton County health officials openly embraced PrEP for HIV prevention on Friday, launching a new clinic for the once-a-day pill to combat the virus among high-risk groups, including gay …

As longtime readers know, there are four or five JMG entries that I repost every year. This is one of them. My dear friend Daniel Johnson, who threw the most kickass Groundhog Day birthday parties for himself, would have been 59 years old today. His was a life that burned brightly and I am illuminated still. Daniel Johnson, 1957-1997. I …

Karen Ocamb reports at Frontiers: AIDS ain’t over, and neither is the effort to find money and fame by charlatans promising a cure. Friday night, controversial libertarian Bill Maher gave a primetime spot on his HBO show Real Time with Bill Maher to an Australian doctor who claims he successfully treated HIV-positive actor Charlie Sheen through an alternative therapy. Maher …

Via press release from the ever-combative AHF: Advocates from AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) stepped up efforts to ensure that Gilead Sciences, Inc. be held accountable for promoting off-label use of Truvada for use as pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to prevent HIV infection. AHF also wants Gilead to be compelled to promote and market use of its AIDS treatment in accordance with …

The use of the medication Truvada as an HIV preventive, a strategy known as PrEP, has not yet been approved by Britain’s National Health Service, a step the FDA took in 2012. Last night the BBC hosted a discussion on the issue in which a representative from the Los Angeles-based AIDS Healthcare Foundation expressed his reservations. As you probably know, …

Via press release from Cytodyn: “Essentially, if PRO 140 is FDA approved, the infected person could finally take a break and go on a vacation without having to remember their pills, and the exact times to take them each day. Some have been on their multiple pill regimen day-in and day-out for decades. Upon FDA approval, all they will need …

According to just declassified British documents, Margaret Thatcher opposed an early HIV awareness campaign because people would learn that anal sex is a thing. Via the Independent: Documents released by the National Archives show that the then health secretary Norman Fowler proposed in February 1986 to publish full-page adverts in national newspapers explaining that unprotected anal intercourse carried one of …

I’d say this is unbelievable, but this is Texas. Via the Houston Press: The State of Texas continued its scorched-earth strategy in dealing with Planned Parenthood this week by stopping more than half a million dollars in federal funding the organization uses for HIV prevention and screening across the Greater Houston area. That money, some $600,000 every year, comes from …

The San Diego Union-Tribune reports: A new medicine to control HIV infection may soon become available, if promising results from a Phase 1 clinical trial are confirmed. The drug is an antibody that neutralizes a broad range of HIV strains. The broadly neutralizing antibody, called VRC01, reduced the level of circulating virus more than 10-fold in 6 of 8 HIV-positive …

Via press release from the Human Rights Campaign: We hope that Martin Shkreli’s departure will mark the end of Turing Pharmaceuticals’ reckless price hikes on life-saving medications,” said Olivia Alair Dalton, HRC’s Senior Vice President for Communications and Marketing. “Turing’s interim CEO Ron Tilles should immediately roll back the company’s unconscionable 5,000 percent price hike on Daraprim, a crucial treatment …

The AIDS Healthcare Foundation today announced that it has placed full-page anti-PrEP ads in gay newspapers all over the country. The full ad is below. They write: A new advocacy ad by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) takes aim at the failure of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), the use of Gilead Sciences’ AIDS treatment Truvada to prevent HIV transmission in uninfected …

Last night a group of noted AIDS activists including Peter Staley and Larry Kramer met in the very apartment where the Gay Men’s Health Crisis was formed 33 years ago to denounce the “abusive pricing” and “profiteering” which continues to put cost of PrEP beyond the means of much of the world. The group has issued a statement: We – …

The CDC today reports that new HIV infections dropped by 19% in the years from 2005 to 2014. But as their headline glumly notes, “progress is uneven” in some communities, especially for black and Latino gay and bisexual men. From their report: Annual HIV diagnoses in the United States fell by 19 percent from 2005 to 2014, driven by dramatic …

Pharma douchebro Martin Shkreli has told Forbes that he regrets not having raised the cost of his AIDS drug even more than he did. From the interview: Martin Shkreli hasn’t changed. If anything, the provocative pharmaceutical CEO — who became “the most hated man in America” earlier this year — thinks he didn’t go far enough when he hiked the …

Last night for World AIDS Day, HBO debuted Vice’s Countdown To Zero, which tracks the search for an HIV cure. Today HBO made the unusual move of making the entire show available on YouTube. Watch below.

For World AIDS Day, CNN’s Sanjay Gupta today reported on PrEP, which is the daily usage of Truvada as an HIV preventive. CNN’s piece characterized PrEP as “controversial” – when in fact it has been endorsed by the CDC and virtually all HIV/AIDS activists and organizations. So you can guess where this “controversy” is REALLY coming from. Watch below.

WATCH THIS. Vanity Fair has posted a short film titled When AIDS Was Funny. The film compiles audio tapes of the homophobic mocking and belittling of gay people and people with AIDS that took place between Ronald Reagan spokesman Larry Speakes and the White House press pool. They write: Using never-before-heard audio tapes from three separate press conferences, in 1982, …

Last night President Obama issued his annual World AIDS Day proclamation which celebrates continuing advances and vows to pursue a cure for HIV. This afternoon the president follows up that message with a personal video. Watch below.