HIV and sex

HIV and sex features

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  Uncomfortable news on lubes for anal sex

  Commercially available sexual lubricants may increase people’s susceptibility to sexually transmitted infection (STIs), US scientists reported recently. A study found that people who consistently used shop-bought ‘lubes’ for...

  From:HIV treatment update

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  Getting tough on criminalisation

  “Nothing short of barbaric.” This was the comment of a BBC presenter, confronted with the number and sheer arbitrary injustice of criminal convictions of people accused of transmitting...

  From:HIV treatment update

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  Saving face: GMFA's sexual health messaging service

  Gay men’s health charity, GMFA, is launching a new service to make telling sexual partners about STIs less daunting. Gus Cairns investigates. ...

  From:HIV treatment update

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  Treatment as prevention works!

  A large randomised study of treatment as prevention has closed more than three years early after interim analysis of the data showed that antiretroviral treatment reduced the...

  From:HIV & AIDS treatment in practice

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  Safer sex in the treatment era

  There is mounting evidence that reducing viral load through HIV treatment may be one of the most effective ways of stopping onward transmission of HIV. But how...

  From:HIV treatment update

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  Do HIV drugs really mean you aren’t infectious?

  Gus Cairns looks at new research on this controversial subject. ...

  From:HIV treatment update

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  Are lubricants safe?

  The ‘lubes’ used most often in sex may actually make HIV transmission more likely. Gus Cairns explores some unnerving new findings from the 2010 International Microbicides Conference. ...

  From:HIV treatment update

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  Love is a danger

  American researchers have reported that gay men in the US are more likely to contract HIV from their main sexual partner than from casual sex.  What are the...

  From:HIV treatment update

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  Sex, sleep and self-esteem: what we need most

  Anxiety and depression, bad sleep, bad sex, and low self-esteem: these are our biggest bugbears as people living with HIV. More than two-thirds of the 1777 people with...

  From:HIV treatment update

HIV and sex in your own words

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  Grateful? I don't think so

  “You must be so grateful that your partner agreed to stay with you despite the fact that you have, you know, AIDS,” said a particularly...

  From:In your own words

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  Preventing mother-to-child transmission

  I found out about my HIV status when I was 16 weeks pregnant. After I had an HIV test, I had counselling with the midwife....

  From:In your own words

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  A problem below stairs...

  I’ve had warts since I was a child – they run in my family. At one point, around the age of 12, I had small...

  From:In your own words

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  My hero!

  Sex. It’s messy, fraught with all sorts of psychological problems and yes, it’s obviously what got me into this whole predicament in the first place....

  From:In your own words

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  Bored and horny

  It’s Sunday afternoon and it’s raining. I’m bored and horny. However, I’ve got £20 left over from the night before and this will be enough...

  From:In your own words

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  Anger - I was furious

  I wasn’t really surprised when I found out I had HIV, after all I went to have an HIV test because I had all the...

  From:In your own words

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  The sex police

  I met Amy through a friend – a friend who knew my HIV status. We got on really well and she asked if I wanted...

  From:In your own words

HIV and sex news from aidsmap

• Gardasil protects against recurrence of pre-cancerous anal lesions in HIV-negative gay men

  The genital wart vaccine Gardasil significantly reduces the risk of high-grade pre-cancerous anal lesion recurrence in men who have sex with men, US investigators report in the online edition of Clinical Infectious Diseases. The vaccine reduced the risk of lesion recurrence ...

  06 February 2012 | Michael Carter

• Antiviral treatment doesn't prevent short episodes of genital herpes reactivation

  High-dose antiviral treatment does not prevent short, sub-clinical shedding of the genital herpes virus, investigators from the US report in the January 5 edition of The Lancet. “Our results show that short episodes of subclinical shedding persist with both standard-dose ...

  06 January 2012 | Michael Carter

• PEP guidelines for the UK revised to take account of undetectable viral load

  New UK guidelines for the use of post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) following sexual exposure have been published in the December issue of the International Journal of STD and AIDS. The guidelines are notable for no longer recommending that PEP is provided ...

  21 December 2011 | Roger Pebody

• Serodiscordant relationships for Africans in the UK often marked by uncertainty and disempowerment

  African people in the UK who are involved in a serodiscordant relationship (where one person has HIV and the other does not) have a wide range of experiences, according to a new study from Sigma Research. Nonetheless, two recurrent ...

  25 November 2011 | Roger Pebody

• Anal HPV infection more likely to persist in gay men compared to heterosexual men

  An international team of investigators have found a possible explanation for the higher rates of anal cancer observed in men who have sex with men (MSM) compared to men who have sex with women (MSW). In the December ...

  03 November 2011 | Michael Carter

• Contraceptive injections and HIV transmission risk - what happens now?

  With new data suggesting that injectable contraceptives may double the risk both of acquiring and passing on HIV, how will this affect women’s contraceptive choices? What are the implications for family planning policy in countries with ...

  26 October 2011 | Roger Pebody

• Reduced susceptibility to first-line drug causes change in UK gonorrhoea prescribing practice

  UK Prescribing guidance for the treatment of gonorrhoea needs to change because of increasing prevalence of bacteria with reduced susceptibility to the first-line antibiotic cefixime, the Health Protection Agency (HPA) has announced.  Some 17% of gonorrhoea samples tested ...

  11 October 2011 | Michael Carter

• Couples often disagree on what they’ve told each other, study finds

  A US study on heterosexual couples at high risk of HIV finds that individuals’ interpretation of their relationship, their reporting of behaviour within the relationship and, especially, their recollection of whether they’ve disclosed sexual risks differ substantially between men ...

  22 September 2011 | Gus Cairns

• The safety spectrum: gay men use many ways to moderate their sexual risk

  The vast majority of gay men, HIV-positive and negative, make some effort to moderate their risk of transmitting or acquiring HIV, a large Australian study finds. Dr Limin Mao of the University of New South Wales in Australia, speaking at the ...

  18 September 2011 | Gus Cairns

• Motivational interviewing, widely used counselling technique, may not work well for sexual behaviour change

  A meta-analysis of sexual risk behaviour reduction using the counselling technique known as motivational interviewing has found little evidence of efficacy, the Tenth AIDS Impact conference heard this week. Researcher Rigmor Berg, of the Norwegian Knowledge Centre for Health Services in Oslo, ...

  16 September 2011 | Gus Cairns

More news

HIV and sex news selected from other sources

• More must be done to reduce hepatitis C transmission amongst HIV positive gay men

  The rate of HIV-positive gay men co-infected with hepatitis C in the UK is too high. It is crucial for this to be addressed as a strategic priority in gay men's health promotion. 

  30 January 2012 | NAT

• HPA Issues Warning About An Outbreak Of Shigella Flexneri Dysentery In Men Who Have Sex With Men

  Sexual health experts at the Health Protection Agency (HPA) have today issued an alert about an outbreak of an infection known as Shigella flexneri dysentery. It is thought that the infection is being transmitted between men during sex.

  18 October 2011 | HPA press release

• Cervical cancer vaccine: NHS choice questioned

  Experts say the UK government may have chosen the least cost-effective vaccine to immunise young teenage girls against viruses that cause cervical cancer.

  28 September 2011 | BBC Health

• Zimbabwe: Women's Latest Bargaining Tool

  "WOMEN think that when you're married, you don't have to worry about HIV. They think it is a safe haven,"said Beauty Nyamwanza of the National Aids Council.

  24 August 2011 | AllAfrica

• Philippines: HIV infections rising steadily among Filipino youth

  MANILA: HIV infections are rising steadily among the Filipino youth and experts say this is the result of engaging in risky sexual behaviours.

  18 August 2011 | Channel News Asia

• I haven't given up, I've taken charge - one man's story of taking HIV meds for prevention

  Recently, I was surprised to learn that I had allegedly “given up on gay men.” According to Michael Weinstein, president and founder of the so-called “AIDS Healthcare Foundation,” I now consider the lives of gay men, including my own, “disposable.” What great crime have I committed to deserve Mr. Weinstein’s condemnation?

  02 August 2011 | Positively Aware

• HIV infection not a death sentence: judge

  An Ottawa judge’s rejection of attempted murder charges against a man accused of knowingly transmitting HIV, saying it is no longer an “automatic death sentence,” reflects medical reality and should send a message to police and prosecutors, Canada’s AIDS experts say.

  17 July 2011 | National Post

• Scientists find first superbug strain of gonorrhea

  Scientists have found a "superbug" strain of gonorrhea in Japan that is resistant to all recommended antibiotics and say it could transform a once easily treatable infection into a global public health threat.

  12 July 2011 | Reuters

• Too Much Too Young – the British 16-24 year olds living with HIV

  Around 10 per cent of new diagnoses each year are of people aged between 16 and 24. Stephen, a 23-year-old in east London, never thought that he would be one of them.

  09 July 2011 | So So Gay

• Sexual Dysfunction Not Necessarily More Common in MSM With HIV

  A new survey confirms that rates of sexual dysfunction are higher in HIV-positive men who have sex with men (MSM) compared with HIV-negative MSM. However, in the absence of other important factors, such as older age or also having an AIDS diagnosis, people living with HIV were no more likely to experience erectile dysfunction. 

  13 June 2011 | AIDSMeds

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