skip to main |
skip to sidebar
PHILADELPHIA - A 50-year-old principal was found naked in his school office while watching gay pornography on Tuesday, according to sources. Sex toys were found nearby, the sources added.
Police said John Acerra was a longtime teacher and principal in the Bethlehem Area School District, but was also allegedly selling crystal meth out of his school office.
Acerra, of Allentown, was the principal of Nitschmann Middle School in Bethlehem, and was arrested minutes after he arranged to sell the notoriously addictive drug to a police informant, according to investigators.
Police arrived and found meth and drug paraphernalia on his desk, according to court papers.
"Mr. Acerra took the money for the product in his office in Nitschmann Middle School," said Randall Miller, Bethlehem police commissioner. "Officers effected the arrest at that location and did recover some drugs."
Police said there was no proof that Acerra was selling drugs to students, and an informant said he sold to them from his school office on weekends and after school hours sometimes.
The case was still under investigation.
from NBC 10
AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), the nation’s largest provider of HIV/AIDS healthcare, education and prevention and direct provider of HIV/AIDS medical care to tens of thousands of AIDS patients in the US, Africa, Latin America/Caribbean and Asia, launches a print advertising campaign this week calling on Pfizer, Inc., the world’s largest pharmaceutical company, to end its marketing of its erectile dysfunction drug, Viagra, as a sexual enhancement drug, thereby encouraging its recreational use and fueling the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV.
The first wave of the Viagra + Meth = Rx for HIV Infection ad campaign begins in New York this week with full-page ads in both The Village Voice and The New York Blade and will launch next week in Los Angeles with an ad appearing in Frontiers Magazine. The ads alert the public to the dangers of combining Viagra with crystal methamphetamines (an illegal drug, also know as crystal meth) and urges the pharmaceutical giant “to exercise responsibility by discontinuing marketing to men with mild erectile dysfunction, and by initiating an educational campaign on the dangers of Viagra and crystal meth, targeting men who have sex with men.”
“Pfizer’s direct to consumer marketing of Viagra as a drug to enhance sexual performance aimed at men who don’t necessarily suffer from erectile dysfunction is irresponsible, especially in light of the drug’s known use as part of a ‘circuit party cocktail’ that is fueling the spread of STDs and HIV,” said Michael Weinstein, President of AIDS Healthcare Foundation. “By marketing Viagra to men with ‘mild’ erectile dysfunction, for men with ‘all degrees of ED, even if it only happens once in a while’ or as a way to ‘improve your sex life’ (as shown in the ad to the right)—as many of the ads state—Pfizer is selling the drug as a way to enhance sexual experience, not as a treatment for an illness. We urge Pfizer to not only end this dangerous marketing tactic, but also to fund a national educational campaign on the dangers of Viagra and crystal meth in order to mitigate the negative impact its advertising continues to have.
”Crystal meth, like many club drugs, is a type of “speed” that keeps the body feeling energetic and hypersexual. Because of the heightened sex drive and feelings of invincibility that crystal meth causes in users, the potential for unprotected sex, and HIV infection, increases dramatically. One of the side effects of crystal meth is that while it increases libido, it also causes impotence, causing many to use erectile dysfunction drugs, like Viagra, to obtain an erection.
Numerous studies linking the use of Viagra—both independently and when used in combination with crystal meth—to an increased risk for STDs and HIV infection, particularly among men who have sex with men, prompted AHF to create the Viagra + Meth = Rx for HIV Infection campaign. A study published in the May 26, 2005 edition of The American Journal of Medicine (Volume 118, No.6) called Sildenafil use, sexual risk behavior, and risk for sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV infection (authored by Sean G. Swearingen, BA, Jeffrey D. Klausner, MD, MPH and funded by the STD Prevention and Control Services, San Francisco Department of Public Health) analyzed data from fourteen studies related to Viagra use (clinical name: sildenafil). The conclusion: “Most studies reported frequent sildenafil use in men who have sex with men, and several showed independent associations between use of the drug and sexual risk behavior, as well as an increased risk for STDs, including HIV infection.
”Among the study’s findings: a study of men who have sex with men in San Francisco showed that 36% of all Viagra users combined its use with other drugs including meth; five studies of men who have sex with men found an increase in unprotected anal sex with a partner of unknown or serodiscordant HIV-status among Viagra users, with users between twice as likely to almost six times as likely to engage in this risk behavior.
“As a physician, I am troubled by the increase in the use of drugs like Viagra in combination with illegal substances like meth and poppers among the patients I see,” added Homayoon Khanlou, MD, Associate Director of Medicine, AIDS Healthcare Foundation. “The trend is particularly disturbing when you can consider how easy it is to obtain Viagra without a prescription and how many people are using the drug outside of medical supervision.”
This latest campaign continues AIDS Healthcare Foundation’s advocacy around the issue of Pfizer’s direct-to-consumer advertising of Viagra. Earlier this year, AHF criticized Pfizer for running a holiday-themed print ad campaign that AHF believed promoted unsafe sex by encouraging the recreational use of Viagra on holidays such as New Year’s Eve and the Super Bowl. The ads, seen in The Wall Street Journal and The L.A. Daily News, among other publications, depicted a handsome, forty-ish male grinning knowingly at the camera with taglines, such as “What are you doing New Year’s Eve?” and “Be this Sunday’s MVP.” Pfizer continued this irresponsible advertising campaign despite having been forced by the U.S. Food and Drug administration to withdraw previous ads, which inferred that men could re-capture their youthful vigor and become a “wild thing” by taking Viagra.
from Aids Healthcare Foundation
A Californian study of recently HIV-infected men who have sex with men (MSM) has found that these men were more likely to have unprotected anal sex when they used recreational drugs – especially methamphetamine (crystal meth) – and erectile dysfunction drugs like sildenafil (Viagra).
Enough studies have looked at this issue that there is now a clear association between unprotected anal intercourse (UAI or ‘barebacking’) and recreational drug use. ‘Association’, however, only means that these behaviours frequently go together: i.e., in general, men who use methamphetamine (crystal meth) are more likely to bareback. This does not mean that meth use causes unprotected sex. The exact relationship between drug use and sexual behaviour may be more complicated, and studies to date have not fully explained that relationship.
In this study published in the November 1st edition of the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes, researchers used different kinds of analyses to shed more light on how drug use affected individual men’s sexual behaviour. They found that men were more likely to bareback at times when they were using methamphetamine or other substances than at times when they were not.
The researchers (based out of University of California, San Diego, and other centres in San Diego and Los Angeles) looked at 194 men who had had sex with other men in the last year. The men were an average of 35 years old, mostly white (nearly 70%), mostly gay (94% - the remainder had had sex with men and women), and well-educated (about 48% had college or higher education). All were recently HIV-infected (an estimated average of four months since infection). This recently-infected group was of particular interest, both because they had probably recently engaged in risky sex, and because viral loads tend to be high in recently-infected individuals, making them more likely to infect others.
Participants provided detailed information about their last three sexual partners, including the kind of sex they had and which drugs (if any) they had used. (Alcohol use was not measured, and no conclusions about the riskiness of alcohol use could be drawn.) Drug use was generally high: 58% had used some sort of drug in at least one sexual encounter, 31% had used crystal meth, 32% poppers (nitrites), 25% marijuana, 13% GHB, and a few had used other drugs. Twenty-three percent had used ‘erectile dysfunction’ drugs – sildenafil (Viagra), vardenafil (Levitra), or tadalafil (Cialis).
The researchers then divided the men into groups, according to whether they had had unprotected intercourse with all (24%), some (60%), or none (16%) of their last three partners. Recreational drug use was lowest in those who had not barebacked at all, and highest in those who had barebacked with all of their most recent partners. Erectile dysfunction drug use, however, was nearly the same in all groups.
The most unique component of the study was an analysis of the men who had only barebacked some of the time, to see the differences between their ‘safe’ and ‘unsafe’ sexual encounters. Recreational drugs were much more commonly used during the ‘barebacking’ encounters – especially crystal meth (5.3 times more common), marijuana (5.7 times), multiple drugs (3.8 times), and poppers (2.6 times).
Methamphetamine use associated with unprotected sex
The researchers stated that, “In all analyses, the most important predictor of UAI [‘barebacking’] among the last three sexual partners was methamphetamine use, suggesting that methamphetamine is an independent predictor of HIV transmission. To our knowledge, our study is the first to demonstrate that methamphetamine is associated with UAI among recently HIV-infected MSM [men who have sex with men], while controlling for individual factors… Considering the high transmissibility of HIV during early infection, these analyses suggest that methamphetamine may contribute significantly to HIV transmission from newly infected MSM to others.”
And the use of marijuana and nitrites?
Other studies have been inconclusive on whether marijuana is associated with greater sexual risks. In this study, although a relationship was found between marijuana use and barebacking, the researchers state that “more than half of marijuana users also used methamphetamine, suggesting that associations between UAI and marijuana may be an artifact of the overlap” – i.e., not truly due to marijuana use itself.
Despite the increased use of nitrites in ‘bareback’ encounters, researchers found the association “ambiguous”: “Lack of association between UAI and nitrite use has been demonstrated previously… nitrites may be less likely to contribute directly to UAI than other substances.”
A role for erectile dysfunction drugs?
Curiously, the researchers found that erectile dysfunction drugs were much more commonly used for unprotected than for protected sex (13.8-fold), but only with the person’s main sexual partner (boyfriend, life partner), not with other (‘casual’) partners. The researchers also point out that erectile dysfunction drug use likely varies depending on sexual role (insertive or ‘top’ vs. receptive or ‘bottom’ partner) – since receptive partners do not necessarily need to be concerned about having an erection – but they did not have enough data to explore this issue further.
Conclusion
The researchers concluded that their study “contributes to the overall understanding of drug use and UAI by (1) providing support to prior studies that demonstrate associations between methamphetamine or [erectile dysfunction drugs] and sexual risk behavior, (2) clarifying that a direct association is likely to exist between specific drugs and UAI, and (3) providing evidence that the use of methamphetamine, [erectile dysfunction drugs], and possibly other illicit substances may contribute to HIV transmission.”
from AidsMap
