WARNING NH
Why the STD Epidemic in America Is About to Get A Lot Worse
President Trump, your “Vietnam” is getting Out of control
OCTOBER 14, 2017
STDs are like the Harvey Weinstein of public health crises,” says Chad Felix Greene, who became HIV positive a decade ago when a partner purposefully transmitted the virus—and who this week, raged on Twitter about California’s new adoption of #HIVIsNotACrime legislation, which reduces knowing transmission from felony to misdemeanor (even in cases of blood bank donation). “Think of it this way: Everyone in this country knows how bad the STD epidemic has gotten, but no one wants to face up to all these difficult conversations we need to have in order to fight the problem.”
Indeed, nationwide, public health experts issued an urgent siren call in the wake of the CDC’s annual Sexually Transmitted Disease Surveillance Report, which revealed yet another rise (the third year in a row now) in the Big Three of tracked STDs in America: chlamydia (1.59 million new cases), gonorrhea (468,514 new cases), syphilis (27,814 new cases, with a tragic 628 cases of congenital syphilis). While HIV rates, tracked separately, reveal a decline nationwide, in several cities around the country such as Miami, Atlanta, New Orleans and San Antonio, Texas, transmissions continue to rise at startling rates. In Bexar County, Texas, for instance, HIV infections jumped by more than 50 percent in the last decade, from 234 in 2006 to 360 in 2016
San Antonio's Mayor Ron Nirenberg, announced this week at an HIV Summit:"Everyone, that means everyone, needs to follow the CDC's recommendations and get tested at least once in their lifetime." If only president trump would follow suit in advocacy - and more importantly funding
If ever there was a POTUS who would understand the gravitas of fighting sexually transmitted diseases - and the epidemic our country now faces - it ought to be this one. Don't forget that in 1997, Donald Trump infamously, joked to Howard Stern that he deserved the "Congressional Medal Of Honor" for his bravery in avoiding sex with so many loose and willing STD-riddled womenin an ordeal he called "My Vietnam." But instead, the unfolding STD health travesty provoked the opposite response from our cammander-in-chief. In what would be a 17 percent reduction in CDC federal STD funding, nationwide
If this course is not reversed, public health experts warn, one of Trumps legacies could be what health officials call an "unconscionable" epidemic of STD's that continues to spread out as the infrastructure to fight the spread breaks down. What would that look like? Billions in healthcare costs and tragic public health consequences such as a rampage of STD caused infertility. For all the lobbing about The Handmaiden's Tale with in pop culture these days, this is one epidemic where the analogy really does fit: Although, many women don't realize it, rising STD's correlate as leading cause of infertility. We now have rates of babies being born with congenital syphilis not seen in decades," says David Harvey, executive director of the National Coalition of STD Directors
Simply put: If the STD prevention infrastructure continues to be gutted, eventually, there will be no going back
In the face of overwhelming data, if all of this doesn't inspire a call to arms, consider this factor: The United States is now seeing cases of gonorrhea for which all known treatments are beginning to fail
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Sounds like California is following New Hampshire's lead and their response to this rising epidemic. NH says screw the STD rates in this country and literally legalized adultery and open marriages. California now following New Hampshire's lead, wants to lesson the charge for knowingly spreading HIV from a felony to a misdemeanor. It says a whole lot about what hundreds of different state house representatives working collectively are capable of only coming up with. Who knew stupid is as stupid does and still will get. From now both, the east and west side of the USA
Indeed, nationwide, public health experts issued an urgent siren call in the wake of the CDC’s annual Sexually Transmitted Disease Surveillance Report, which revealed yet another rise (the third year in a row now) in the Big Three of tracked STDs in America: chlamydia (1.59 million new cases), gonorrhea (468,514 new cases), syphilis (27,814 new cases, with a tragic 628 cases of congenital syphilis). While HIV rates, tracked separately, reveal a decline nationwide, in several cities around the country such as Miami, Atlanta, New Orleans and San Antonio, Texas, transmissions continue to rise at startling rates. In Bexar County, Texas, for instance, HIV infections jumped by more than 50 percent in the last decade, from 234 in 2006 to 360 in 2016
San Antonio's Mayor Ron Nirenberg, announced this week at an HIV Summit:"Everyone, that means everyone, needs to follow the CDC's recommendations and get tested at least once in their lifetime." If only president trump would follow suit in advocacy - and more importantly funding
If ever there was a POTUS who would understand the gravitas of fighting sexually transmitted diseases - and the epidemic our country now faces - it ought to be this one. Don't forget that in 1997, Donald Trump infamously, joked to Howard Stern that he deserved the "Congressional Medal Of Honor" for his bravery in avoiding sex with so many loose and willing STD-riddled womenin an ordeal he called "My Vietnam." But instead, the unfolding STD health travesty provoked the opposite response from our cammander-in-chief. In what would be a 17 percent reduction in CDC federal STD funding, nationwide
If this course is not reversed, public health experts warn, one of Trumps legacies could be what health officials call an "unconscionable" epidemic of STD's that continues to spread out as the infrastructure to fight the spread breaks down. What would that look like? Billions in healthcare costs and tragic public health consequences such as a rampage of STD caused infertility. For all the lobbing about The Handmaiden's Tale with in pop culture these days, this is one epidemic where the analogy really does fit: Although, many women don't realize it, rising STD's correlate as leading cause of infertility. We now have rates of babies being born with congenital syphilis not seen in decades," says David Harvey, executive director of the National Coalition of STD Directors
Simply put: If the STD prevention infrastructure continues to be gutted, eventually, there will be no going back
In the face of overwhelming data, if all of this doesn't inspire a call to arms, consider this factor: The United States is now seeing cases of gonorrhea for which all known treatments are beginning to fail
_________________________________________________________
Sounds like California is following New Hampshire's lead and their response to this rising epidemic. NH says screw the STD rates in this country and literally legalized adultery and open marriages. California now following New Hampshire's lead, wants to lesson the charge for knowingly spreading HIV from a felony to a misdemeanor. It says a whole lot about what hundreds of different state house representatives working collectively are capable of only coming up with. Who knew stupid is as stupid does and still will get. From now both, the east and west side of the USA
