Bible Belt communities and HIV/AIDS conferences have viewed “deepsou+h,” which independent journalist and filmmaker Lisa Biagiotti created to document HIV/AIDS in the rural South. Biagiotti hopes the film will stimulate HIV discussion, especially among sex educators; faith communities; and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender communities. To capture content for “deepsou+h,” Biagiotti traveled 13,000 miles through the rural South and interviewed more than 400 HIV-affected people throughout a two-year period.
The stories of three individuals form the centerpiece of “deepsou+h”: Monica Johnson, founder and chief executive officer (CEO) of HEROES; Kathie Hiers, CEO of AIDS Alabama; and college student Joshua Alexander. Johnson, who has been HIV-infected for 28 years, lost a three-year-old son to HIV. Johnson’s organization, HEROES, provides HIV prevention through after-school activities in rural Louisiana. Hiers stated that more than half of HIV deaths have taken place in the South. Alexander has had HIV for six years.
The film’s first community showing took place at Edisto Fork United Methodist Church. Other venues have included a National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day showing in Orangeburg, S.C.; the 2012 International AIDS Conference in Washington, D.C.; and the 2012 United States Conference on AIDS in Las Vegas.
South Carolina viewers’ comments addressed the fact that everyone—not just gay men—is vulnerable to HIV infection. Although improvements in HIV education are needed, Aaron Bryan, HIV coordinator for the, Department of Health and Environmental Control/South Carolina Department of Education’s S.C. Healthy Schools, noted that factors such as poverty heavily influence health outcomes. Others expressed hope that the Affordable Care Act will result in increased access to healthcare for South Carolina residents.
Additional information about “deepsou+h” is available from http://deepsouthfilm.com/ or http://lisabiagiotti.com/.
Australian Health Minister Tanya Plibersek announced that the country has begun vaccinating pre-teen boys with Gardasil, the vaccine to prevent human papillomavirus (HPV), in a government-sponsored program to prevent cervical cancer. More than 280,000 boys will be eligible for free vaccination, which also protects against genital warts. The vaccine will be administered in three doses over seven months along with the HPV vaccination for girls that began in 2007. Plibersek noted that because of the country’s immunization program, Australia’s HPV vaccine coverage rates are among the best in the world, with a resulting significant drop in HPV-related infections. She added that the government is confident that extending the program to males will reduce HPV-related cancer and disease in the future.
The Department of Health and Aging (DOHA) argued that the disease mostly affects mature women and in 98 percent of cases it clears by itself. DOHA questioned the necessity of the $451 million investment in pre-teen vaccinations and stated that in rare cases, if the virus persists and goes undetected, it could lead to cervical cancer—but this usually takes approximately 10 years.
In a video promoting the program, Dr. Julia Brotherton explained that the HPV vaccine is administered to 12 to 13 year olds because at that time their immune systems are healthy and produce excellent antibody levels, providing great levels of protection when they receive the vaccine at that age. Professor Ian Frazer cited data from major clinical trials used to test the vaccine when it was first developed. He noted that in clinical trials with 20,000 women, none of the participants who were vaccinated caught HPV during five years of follow–up, whereas many in the control group acquired the virus fairly frequently.
Researchers in Australia’s Centre for Innate Immunity and Infectious Diseases at the Monash Institute of Medical Research have identified a “new” protein, interferon epsilon (IFNe), that exists only in the female reproductive tract. According to team leader Professor Paul Herzog, IFNe—a naturally produced molecule—boosts women’s immune response and plays a key role in protecting them from STDs like chlamydia.
Other proteins that boost immune response are produced only in response to infection with a virus or bacteria. In contrast, female hormones regulate the production of IFNe. Herzog explained that IFNe levels fluctuate with hormone levels during the ovulation cycle—when IFNe levels are lowest, women are more susceptible to STD infection. When a woman becomes pregnant or enters menopause, her hormones shut down the production of IFNe.
Since IFNe follows different rules from other proteins, Herzog believes understanding how IFNe works may be helpful in addressing HIV and human papillomavirus and in developing vaccines that stimulate immune response. It may also be possible to apply IFNe research to endometriosis, pelvic inflammatory disease, and other reproductive system diseases.
The incidence of chlamydia among Australians has tripled in the last 10 years, and rates are highest among people ages 15 to 19, according to 2011 Australian Bureau of Statistics. Data indicate there are more chlamydia-infected women over age 15 (46,636) than men (33,197) over age 15.
The full article, “Interferon-e Protects the Female Reproductive Tract from Viral and Bacterial Infection,” was published online in the journal Science (2013; doi: 10.1126/science.1233321).
Lisa Terry, director of the AIDS Task Force of Northeast Indiana, has written and is directing a skit that will educate women about the dangers of HIV/AIDS. Several women executive directors of area nonprofit organizations will act in the skit, including Becky Weimerskirch, executive director of Community Transportation Network; Nancy Lorraine, executive director of Turnstone; Debby Beckman, president and chief executive officer of the YWCA of Northeast Indiana; and other volunteers from nonprofit agencies. Some of these executive directors are in a support group together, and they willingly volunteered to participate when Terry asked them.
The one-act drama, titled “The Birds, the Bees, and HIV,” is set in an obstetrics/gynecology office waiting room, where the women sit in a semicircle and discuss topics such as safe sex and HIV/AIDS in a fun and instructive manner. They will perform the skit at a free brown bag seminar at the YWCA Northeast Indiana branch on National Women and Girls HIV/AIDS Awareness Day. The brown bag event will provide women a chance to find out more about the disease. Following the skit, the audience can take part in a question-and-answer session, submitting questions anonymously if they choose.
CDC data for 2009 indicate that there were an estimated 11,200 new HIV infections among women in the United States, with women comprising 51 percent of the US population and 23 percent of those newly infected with HIV. In 2009, African-American women contracted HIV 15 times more often than white women, while Hispanic/Latino women were infected three times more often than white women.
For more information on the event or to RSVP, contact Sue Hiatt at (260) 424–4908, extension 254, or at shiatt@ywcaerew.org.
Three former patients of Olean General Hospital in New York are suing the hospital and several insulin pen manufacturers. They allege the hospital’s misuse of insulin pens is at fault for their hepatitis infections; their lawyer contends that hospital employees were misusing the pens by reusing them on multiple patients. The lawsuit was filed after Cattaraugus County public health officials reported that at least eight people had tested positive for hepatitis after screening by Olean General. However, Dennis J. McCarthy, spokesperson for Olean General, contends that there is no proof that the people who tested positive for hepatitis contracted it through reused insulin pens.
The plaintiffs filed suit more than a month after the hospital warned 1,915 former patients that they might have been exposed to HIV, hepatitis B, and hepatitis C through possible reuse of the pens between November 2009 and January 16, 2013. The hospital suspended its use of insulin pens and advised former patients to get blood tests. The hospital stated that insulin pen reuse was not allowed, but may have occurred. They explained that the practice was to label insulin pens for each patient and there was no evidence that a pen was used on more than one patient.
Although the Oscar-nominated film “How to Survive a Plague” did not win its category during this year’s awards, the story behind the documentary is destined for much broader future exposure. The American Broadcasting Company has optioned the rights to the film, which chronicles the story of AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) and Treatment Action Group (TAG) during the early years of the disease in the late 1980s and 1990s, with plans to create a television miniseries. The work of ACT UP and TAG members at the height of the AIDS crisis during the 1980s enabled them to interact in crucial ways with scientists, researchers, and regulators. The film’s director David France explains, “We know we’d like it to be an extended story that’s not just about AIDS and what AIDS wrought but about this tremendous civil rights movement that grew from the ashes of AIDS and the dawn of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender movement.”
The Lewistown, Mont., Central Montana Medical Center (CMMC) is offering hepatitis C antibody screening exams for $35 a person this year. In addition, the medical center will host a hepatitis C presentation by Dr. Keith Hopkins on March 5 at 6:30 p.m. in CMMC Conference Room 1. Laboratory representatives will be available at the event to sign up individuals for appointments to have their blood drawn for the screening exam in time to receive their results at the CMMC Community Health Fair on April 13 from 8:00 to 11:00 a.m. CMMC is located at 408 Wendell Avenue, Lewistown, Montana.
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