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Saturday, May 17, 2008
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Rex Wockner |
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| International News | |
| SWISS EXPERTS SAY HIV+
PEOPLE WITH NO VIRAL LOAD
CANNOT TRANSMIT HIV Swiss AIDS officials have determined that if you're taking anti-HIV drugs and you always take the drugs on schedule and your HIV blood tests come back "undetectable" for six months in a row and you don't have any other sexually transmitted diseases, it is next to impossible that you could transmit HIV during unprotected sex (barebacking). The Swiss Federal Commission on HIV/AIDS issued its stunning report January 30, concluding that people with HIV who have no detectable viral load as a result of anti-retroviral treatment apparently are unable to transmit the virus. The report said an individual becomes noninfectious if he or she has had an undetectable viral load for six months, doesn't skip any doses of HIV medication and has no other STDs. The commission arrived at its position following an extensive review of scientific literature, after prolonged discussions, and upon recommendation of its Subcomission on Clinical and Therapeutic Aspects. In an English summary of its report, the agency said: "During effective ART [anti-retroviral therapy], free virus is absent from blood and genital secretions. Epidemiologic and biologic data indicate that during such treatment, there is no relevant risk of transmission. Residual risk cannot be scientifically excluded, but is, in the judgment of the commission, negligibly small. "The commission realizes that medical and biologic data available today do not permit proof that HIV infection during effective ART is impossible, because the non-occurrence of an improbable event cannot be proven. If no transmission events were observed among 100 couples followed for two years, for instance, there might still be some such events if 10,000 couples are followed for 10 years. "The situation is analogous to 1986, when the statement 'HIV cannot be transmitted by kissing' was publicized," the commission said. "This statement cannot be proven, but after 20 years' experience its accuracy appears highly plausible. "Concerning the statement, 'An HIV-infected person on anti-retroviral therapy with completely suppressed viremia ... cannot propagate HIV through sexual contact,' however, the evidence is much better than what was available in 1986 regarding kissing." POLICE CLOSE BUENOS AIRES BEAR CLUB City inspectors and federal police shut down the Buenos Aires Bears clubhouse January 23. The officials claimed they were verbally instructed by higher-ups to close the building because of a pre-existing closure order that had resulted from a noise complaint. But a spokesman for the club, Marcelo Surano, said the noise complaint had been resolved and the facility has newer paperwork authorizing its operation. The raiding officers had no documents to back up their claims, so the bears refused to let them into the building. But the bears left nonetheless, and the officers then slapped a "closed" notice on the entrance. "Under this city government, it seems that the police feel protected in having discriminatory attitudes toward Gays and Lesbians," María Rachid, president of the Argentine Federation of Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Trans (FALGBT), told the newspaper Página/12. Rachid said FALGBT will file a complaint with federal Justice officials over the federal police's attempt "to enter a private place without a legitimate official order." "This is a violation of human rights," she said. The group also will send a letter to Mayor Mauricio Macri denouncing the city inspectors' "discriminatory attitudes." MOSCOW PRIDE: THIRD TIME'S A CHARM? Despite bans from the mayor and violent attacks from neofascists, skinheads, Christians and police in 2006 and 2007, Moscow Gays will again try to stage a Gay pride parade this year. "The authorities have no legal basis for banning the event," said chief organizer Nikolai Alekseev. "That is why, even if they ban it again, we will still go on the streets to realize our constitutional right to freedom of assembly." The parade is set for May 31, after an international human rights conference scheduled for May 30. A lawsuit over Mayor Yuri Luzhkov's ban of the 2006 parade is presently before the European Court of Human Rights. Last year, Luzhkov unleashed a harsh attack on the parade, saying: "[In 2006], Moscow came under unprecedented pressure to sanction the Gay parade, which can be described in no other way than as satanic. We did not let the parade take place then, and we are not going to allow it in the future. Some European nations bless single-sex marriages and introduce sexual guides in schools. Such things are a deadly moral poison for children." Activists did not attempt to defy last year's ban. Instead, they gathered near City Hall on pride day to protest the ban. A melee ensued and several Gays and Lesbians were beaten and bloodied by Orthodox Christian and ultra-nationalist protesters as hundreds of police officers stood by and watched. Thirty-one people were detained, including members of European parliaments who had traveled to Moscow to support the pride events. "On numerous occasions," said the BBC, "nationalists circled Gay rights activists as they spoke with journalists, then reached in to punch or kick the person being interviewed. Police intervened to arrest dozens of Gay rights activists and only rarely detained their attackers." "There is no rule of law in Moscow," said British Gay leader Peter Tatchell, who suffered a swollen and bloodied right eye in the melee. "The right to protest does not exist. This is not a democracy." Tatchell said "marauding gangs" of "neo-Nazis, nationalist extremists and Russian Orthodox fundamentalists ... infiltrated the Gay pride crowd and began indiscriminately attacking participants. The Moscow police looked on and did nothing." "It was [a] short [pride]," Dutch European Parliament Member Sophie in't Veld said at the time. "Police did nothing to arrest hooligans. ... I saw a guy with a knife ... and I thought: 'That's it. I'm out of here.'" Pride participant Claudia Roth, chairwoman of Germany's Green Party, said, "It has been shown once again today that human rights are systematically abused in [President Vladimir] Putin's Russia." The 2006 pride events met the same fate. After Luzhkov banned the parade, organizers tried to lay flowers at the Kremlin's Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and hold a rally near City Hall. Participants in both small events were violently attacked by neofascists, skinheads, Christians and riot police, and the pride organizers were arrested. The charges were later dropped. SPANIARDS SUPPORT SAME-SEX MARRIAGE LAW Three-quarters of Spaniards support the nation's two-year-old law that lets same-sex couples marry. Spain is one of six countries that have opened traditional marriage to Gay couples. A new Instituto Opina/Cadena Ser poll found that 74.5 percent of respondents support the law and only 18.1 percent want to see it repealed. The remainder had no opinion. President José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero recently reaffirmed his support for Gay marriage, saying, "We will not take one step backward in our defense of tolerance and freedom." Pollsters questioned 1,000 Spanish adults by telephone on January 8 and reported a margin of error of 3.1 percent. Same-sex couples also have access to full marriage in Belgium, Canada, the Netherlands, South Africa and the U.S. state of Massachusetts. NEARLY 500 CZECH GAY COUPLES HAVE REGISTERED By the end of last year, 487 same-sex couples had taken advantage of the Czech Republic's registered-partnership law, the Czech News Agency reported January 28. Gay-male partnerships outnumbered Lesbian couplings 353 to 134. Eight of the couples later cancelled their registrations. The law took effect in July 2006 after the Chamber of Deputies overrode President Vaclav Klaus' veto of it. The statute grants many of the rights and obligations of marriage but withholds equality in the areas of adoption, pensions, taxation and joint ownership of property. With assistance from Bill Kelley |
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| picture - Buenos Aires Bears Clubhouse |
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| Quote/Unquote | |
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| by Rex Wockner -
SGN Contributing Writer "I don't think that's a radical view to say we're going to affirm marriage. I think the radical view is to say that we're going to change the definition of marriage so that it can mean two men, two women, a man and three women, a man and a child, a man and animal. Again, once we change the definition, the door is open to change it again. I think the radical position is to make a change in what's been historic." - Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee when asked by BeliefNet.com on January 17, "Is it your goal to bring the Constitution into strict conformity with the Bible?" "Gov. Mike Huckabee is establishing an unfortunate pattern on the campaign trail - making statements about Gays and Lesbians that demonstrate he's out of touch with the vast majority of Americans. Voters should take a close look at the governor's pattern of ill-informed and extreme statements. Gov. Huckabee should remember it's 2008, not 1968, and he's running for president, not preacher." - Log Cabin Republicans President Patrick Sammon in a January 18 statement. "I don't trust either Clinton on Gay issues. Sure, they're better than any Republican on the issues we're confronting. But they know that already. And they'll never take a risk for Gay equality because they assume we have nowhere else to go." - Writer Andrew Sullivan on his blog, January 17. "You'll hear Clinton people try to say, 'Oh, we made such advances [under President Clinton].' We made no advances. We got left with 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell,' and the Defense of Marriage Act. So, were there reasons for that? Yes. However, there's cleanup to do now and we have to move forward and get laws in place." - Former Human Rights Campaign President Elizabeth Birch to the Boston Gay newspaper Bay Windows, January 10. "'Don't Ask, Don't Tell,' as articulated, as I worked it out with Colin Powell, who was then the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, meant literally that - that people would be free to live their lives. As long as they didn't go march in Gay rights parades or go to Gay bars in uniform - in uniform - and talk about it on duty, they would be all right. Now, as soon as he [Powell] left, the anti-Gay forces then in the military started using it as an excuse to kick people out." - Former President Bill Clinton on the campaign trail for his wife, January 18. "There were, indeed, some factual inaccuracies in President Clinton's statement about 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell.' ... Military members cannot be out to anyone, at any time, while serving under the law. Statements to friends, family members or anyone else are grounds for dismissal from the armed forces, as they have been since day one. The law, indeed, practically prevents any Gay American, who is out in any way, from serving in the military." - Aubrey Sarvis, executive director of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, to syndicated Gay press columnist Chris Crain, January 24. "What's a feminist civil-rights supporter to do? This is an embarrassment of riches we have in the Democratic primary. Sure, they all have their limitations, but when was the last time we had some viable, charismatic choices? When didn't you hold your nose to vote for the president. ... We feminists are between a Barack and a hard place. Our fantasy presidential teams are flush." - Tracy Baim, publisher of the Chicago gay newspaper Windy City Times, in a January 16 opinion column. "I think it's wrong for the government to discriminate against people because of that person's sexual orientation. I think that Gay men and women ought to have the same rights as heterosexual men and women to make contracts, to have hospital-visiting rights and to join together in marriage, and I don't understand why it is considered by some people to be a threat to heterosexual marriage to allow it by Gays and Lesbians. Shouldn't we be promoting the kind of faithfulness and loyalty to one's partner regardless of sexual orientation? Because if you don't do that, then, to that extent, you're promoting promiscuity and you're promoting all the problems that can result from promiscuity. And the loyalty and love that two people feel for one another when they fall in love ought to be celebrated and encouraged, and shouldn't be prevented by any form of discrimination in the law." - Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore in a video posted at Current.com, January 17. See tinyurl.com/yrazcf. "God knows it's not easy to live here [in San Francisco]. It's way too expensive; you know traffic is awful; there's a lot of drawbacks to living here. But you're so heavily rewarded by your surroundings in terms of both people and scenery - and people who are scenery!" - Tales of the City author Armistead Maupin to The Out Traveler, spring 2008 issue. "[Newspaper columnist] Herb Caen used to cringe over the years at the term 'Frisco,' but the only one that really bothers me is 'San Fran.' It's the term that visiting flight attendants use. It's not really a term of affection for locals. It's increased in popularity in recent years, but I cringe when I hear 'San Fran.' It's just a bug up my ass." - Tales of the City author Armistead Maupin to The Out Traveler, spring 2008 issue. "[The worst part is] the boredom. You're outside 24/7 in the mud with absolutely nothing to do except talk to people. So, yeah, there were times when I lost my mind." - Todd Herzog, openly Gay winner of the most-recent season of TV's Survivor, to Chicago's Windy City Times, January 9. "I think the majority of the American public cares less about it than reporters like you do." - Singer Clay Aiken when asked by Time Out New York on January 17, "What do you make of people nagging you about the Gay thing?" "It's really sad if people see me like that. Just because somebody has kinky tastes doesn't mean that they're seedy. People who know me and love me would never call me that." - Boy George to London's Daily Mail, January 18. George recently was charged with falsely imprisoning a male escort by chaining him to the wall of his flat. "I wanted 2007 to end, with a line drawn firmly under it, and move on. The last couple of years were shit. I mean, I got arrested twice. I'll be 47 in June. I've had enough. It affects everything in your life. I don't ever want to see a policeman again. I have a New Year's resolution. I'm going to try hard to become a shrinking violet." - Boy George to London's Daily Mail, January 18. "I open my mouth and bitchy things come out. I'm really trying to curb that. It doesn't make me look good. I was reading some things I'd said and I sounded horrible." - Boy George to London's Daily Mail, January 18. With assistance from Bill Kelley picture: Armistead Maupin |
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