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The rates of AIDS and HIV infections in the District are the worst among the city's black population, while an alarming number of new cases are appearing in women and even some young children, according to a broad report released yesterday by city officials. "It is a modern epidemic that affects all populations of the District of Columbia," D.C. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty said while outlining plans to increase testing for the virus and strengthen prevention measures in the nation's capital. The statistics in the study by the city's HIV/AIDS Administration and George Washington University paint a grim picture.

NEW YORK - To activists concerned about AIDS and prisoners' rights, it's an urgent, commonsense step that should already be nationwide policy — letting inmates have condoms to reduce the spread of sexually transmitted diseases behind bars. Yet their efforts have run headlong into a stronger political force: Authorities' desire not to encourage inmates who flout prison rules against sex. Only one state, Vermont, and five cities regularly hand out condoms to inmates. Mississippi does so only for inmates receiving conjugal visits from their spouses. Left out are the vast majority of America's 2.2 million prisoners — many held in...

The number of newly diagnosed cases of the three most common sexually transmitted diseases rose for the second year in a row in the U.S., driven in part by an increase in risky sexual behavior, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Tuesday. *** Of particular concern is a rising number of syphilis cases among gay and bisexual men, Douglas said. A large proportion of these men were HIV positive and became more sexually active when better AIDS drugs improved their health, he said. *** Gay and bisexual men made up 64% of new cases of primary and secondary...

ATLANTA, Georgia (AP) -- More than 1 million cases of chlamydia were reported in the United States last year -- the most ever reported for a sexually transmitted disease, federal health officials said Tuesday. "A new U.S. record," said Dr. John M. Douglas Jr. of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More bad news: Gonorrhea rates are jumping again after hitting a record low, and an increasing number of cases are caused by a "superbug" version resistant to common antibiotics, federal officials said Tuesday. Syphilis is rising, too. The rate of congenital syphilis -- which can deform or kill...

ATLANTA - More than 1 million cases of chlamydia were reported in the United States last year — the most ever reported for a sexually transmitted disease, federal health officials said Tuesday. ADVERTISEMENT Officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said they think better and more intensive screening accounts for much of the increase, but added that chlamydia was not the only sexually transmitted disease on the rise. Gonorrhea rates are jumping again after hitting a record low, and an increasing number of cases are caused by a "superbug" version resistant to common antibiotics.

EIGHT deaths have been linked to the cervical cancer jab which will be given to every 12-year-old girl in Britain under Government plans announced last week. Doctors suspect the jab, which protects against a sexually transmitted human papilloma virus that causes the cancer, may be implicated in 3,461 adverse reactions, including paralysis and seizures. Last week Health Secretary Alan Johnson revealed plans to vaccinate all girls aged between 12 and 13 to cut Britain’s death rate from the disease. He said: “Prevention is better than cure and this vaccine will prevent many women from catching the virus in the first...

Ugandans Respond to Homosexual Lobby's Attack Against Anti-Sodomy Laws International organization, Human Rights Watch, has history of opposing human life and family legislation By Matthew Cullinan Hoffman UGANDA, September 24, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Dr. Martin Ssempa, spokesman for Uganda's Interfaith Rainbow Coalition Against Homosexuality (INFAH), recently blasted the pro-gay organization "Human Rights Watch" for "numerous errors and misrepresentations" in their recent letter accusing the Uganda government of human rights abuses for enforcing the country's anti-sodomy laws. "What you characterize as 'harassment' of homosexuals or 'threatening statements' by high government officials is in reality nothing more than the enforcement of the...

Halton Catholic School Board Approves Controversial HPV Vaccinations on School Premises All three student trustees supported resolution to ban the vaccine from Board's schools but did not have right to vote By John-Henry Westen HAMILTON, September 19, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In a move which came as an unexpected shock to many in the pro-life movement, the board of trustees at the Halton Catholic District School Board voted 4-3 to reject a motion to forbid the controversial HPV vaccine to be offered or administered on the Catholic school board's premises for the duration of this school year.  The board has instead...

Ontario Bishops Warns Catholic Trustees Against HPV Vaccine - Second Board Delays Vaccination Program Halton District School Board to vote Tuesdya on motion opposing HPV vaccination  By John-Henry WestenBURLINGTON, September 14, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In a September 13 letter to Catholic trustees and parents in the Halton Catholic District School Board (HCDSB), Hamilton Bishop Anthony Tonnos has warned against the introduction of the Human Papilloma Virus vaccine.  The letter, sent with his signature, was drafted at a September 10 meeting of the Ontario Bishops Conference following a request from Catholic school boards.By order of the Ontario Liberal Government, the vaccines...

Ontario City's Catholic Trustees Oppose HPV Vaccination in Schools, Stall Implementation By John-Henry Westen SAULT STE. MARIE, ON, September 13, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Elected trustees of the Huron-Superior Catholic District School Board (H-SCDSB) have objected to implementing a plan to vaccinate girls in the Board's Catholic schools with the controversial HPV vaccine.  The recently developed HPV vaccine is designed to prevent the sexually transmitted disease Human Papilloma Virus (HPV), the leading cause of cervical cancer.  HPV is not preventable with condom use.  The vaccine has had little long-term testing and is thus of concern to some health-care professionals. "This is...

AUSTIN, Texas - Heather Burcham, whose battle with cervical cancer led her to urge legislators to try to keep girls from sharing in her fate, has died of the disease. She was 31. Burcham, of Houston, died Saturday. "Her pain and suffering have forever ceased," Gov. Rick Perry said Monday. He said she was "an inspiration to myself, my staff and others." Perry issued an executive order in February that would have required the newly approved human papillomavirus vaccine for girls entering the sixth grade, to help protect them from cervical cancer

We finally have true bipartisanship in Washington. Members of Congress have reached across party lines — to be nearly universally despised for a host of reasons. I love it when a plan comes together. The latest Gallup poll shows that 14% of Americans have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in the U.S. Congress — ironically, the exact same percentage who would get in a strangers car because he has candy. Unfortunately, all too often, our opinions of Congress are not unlike our view of lawyers: They’re all jerks… except ours. A full 86% of Americans have...

New STD Infection Rates “4 times higher among those who used condoms during their last vaginal intercourse”: M. Genitalium Surpasses Gonorrhea among Young Adults Reports Health Journal By Peter J. Smith SEATTLE, Washington, June 12, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A new study reveals that a relatively new sexually transmitted disease (STD) has surpassed gonorrhea in prevalence among sexually active young adults in the United States. The disease, Mycoplasma genitalium, was first identified back in the 1980s as the smallest known bacterium in existence. Now researchers at the University of Washington in Seattle found that 1.0 percent of the several thousand participants...

On many nights, in the back rooms of bars, community centers and church meeting halls around the city, George Perez sits around a platter of cold cuts with perhaps a dozen other men to talk about sex. While the conversation is often explicit — even lascivious — these gatherings are deadly serious. Some 25 years after the AIDS epidemic began, Perez, an 18-year veteran counselor with the Metropolitan Health District, tries to help the other men at the table understand why they're risking their own health — and the health of others — through unsafe sex practices. "If my need...

NEW YORK - A relatively new sexually transmitted infection has surpassed Neisseria gonorrhea in prevalence among young adults in the U.S., according to a new study.

... human papilloma virus is only one sexually transmitted disease. There is no vaccine for herpes, Hepatitis C, HIV. ... Unfortunately, sexual contact is not necessary for the transmission of cancer-causing HPV. ... Hand-to-hand contact can transmit cancer-causing HPV. . ... However, cancer-causing strains of HPV, including strains 16 and 18, can also be found on the hands and fingers. Squamous cell carcinoma of the finger is almost exclusively caused by HPV strains 16 and 18 ... I have treated several patients that had persistent warts on their hands or fingers caused by cancer-causing strains of HPV. I have seen...

WHEATON, Ill. (AP) -- A judge has ordered a 17-year-old to pay a $750 fine and perform 120 hours of community service for contaminating salad dressing with semen and returning it to a suburban Chicago high school's cafeteria. DuPage County Judge Terence Sheen also placed Marco Castro on two years probation Wednesday and ordered him to write a letter of apology to Wheaton North High School officials. Castro must complete his community service work for an agency that works with AIDS patients.

Scores of veterans across the country are getting lifetime checks from the government for gonorrhea, genital herpes and other venereal diseases they caught while in the ranks. The disability payments are made under a little-known provision from three decades ago that entitles vets to monthly benefits for sexually transmitted diseases they contracted, or simply aggravated, while in the service -- even if they became infected on their own time years ago. Under the rule Congress created at the end of the Vietnam War, even genital warts are considered a "service-connected" condition entitling a vet to the same $100 or more...

JUDI GIULIANI Germ-warfare adviser. Rudy Giuliani consulted his wife Judith on bioterrorism after 9/11, and considered her "an expert we rely on" at his consulting firm.....the ex-mayor spoke about Judy's role in a 2003 interview, with his bride at his side: "She gives us a lot of advice and a lot of help in areas where she's got a lot of expertise - biological and chemical," the ex-mayor said in a taping never aired in the US. "And since we do security work, that's an area of great concern - you know, another anthrax attack, a smallpox attack, chemical...

When John got divorced after 12 years of marriage, he took a deep breath and launched into the dating scene. "And wham, with my very first girlfriend, I caught herpes," he says. "You feel betrayed and all of a sudden separated from the rest of the world. I thought at the time that the girl who gave it to me and I were the only people in the world who had it." But John and his date are far from alone. And the growing number of people in similar situations has created a new industry: Internet dating sites just for...