Apr 30, 2004  |  By: LOU CHIBBARO JR.  | COMMENTS     

Pornographic film studios producing adult videos for gay men were recognized as models for safe sex practices earlier this month as California’s multi-billion dollar straight adult film industry voluntarily suspended operations after two performers tested HIV positive.

Unlike the gay studios, nearly all of the straight pornographic film production companies based largely in Southern California encourage sexual acts without the use of condoms, according to a health foundation that provides services to the porn industry.

“In our part of the industry, mandatory condom use has been the rule since the 1980s,” said Todd Montgomery, vice president of Falcon Studios, one of the nation’s largest gay adult film companies.

Montgomery said a few, smaller gay porn studios have recently begun producing “barebacking” videos, in which performers engage in anal intercourse without a condom.

“They are scorned by the industry,” he said. “This is being done in a very small number of places which we hope, over time, will go away.”

Officials with the Adult Industry Medical Health Care Foundation, which was created by the straight porn studios, said the foundation provides HIV testing to about 1,200 performers in the industry once a month under mandatory rules established by the studios, the New York Times reported.

A requirement that the performers provide a written report of their negative HIV status each month as a condition for working had largely kept the male and female performers free from HIV during the past decade, industry spokespersons said.

But what appeared to be an effective system in screening for HIV fell short last month when a male porn star went to Brazil to perform in a film, industry officials disclosed. HIV testing isn’t mandatory for adult film performers in that country. When he returned to California, he resumed work in a porn film production after testing negative.

To the dismay of those he worked with, he tested positive one month later after having performed in films with at least 12 females, industry officials told the Los Angeles Times. One of the female performers tested positive, the L.A. Times reported, and studio officials identified about 65 performers who had sex with someone else who had sex with one of the two.

On April 13, the Adult Industry Medical Health Care Foundation, which is known as AIM, identified on its Web site Darren James as the “screen name” of the male porn star who contracted HIV while making a film in Brazil. The foundation identified Laura Roxx as the screen name of the female porn star whom he infected when he returned to the United States to continue his work on porn films.

The foundation, one week later, published on its Web site the screen names of more than 45 first and second generation contacts with James and Fox in subsequent films before James’ next HIV test turned up positive.

L.A. County health officials on April 22 ordered AIM to hand over medical files on more than 50 porn performers who may have had sexual relations with James and Foxx or others who had sex with the two. Peter Kerndt, director of the sexually transmitted disease prevention program for L.A. County, said the real names of the performers would be kept confidential.

He said the department would conduct contact tracing to alert the performers’ spouses or personal partners outside the film industry, just as it does for other county residents found to have a sexually transmitted disease.

Ira Levine, chair of AIM’s board of directors, called the action by the county a violation of the privacy rights of the
foundation’s clients.

Montgomery said gay porn studios don’t require performers to disclose their HIV status.

Porn studios close down
Fearing that HIV could spread among performers who often work in several different porn production studios, nearly all of the major studios producing straight porn films announced two weeks ago that they had voluntarily suspended filming for 60 days. This would allow all performers who had sexual contact with an infected person to be tested twice.

News of these developments prompted the Los Angeles County Health Department and the California Occupational Health & Safety Administration, known as Cal-OSHA, to consider opening an investigation into health and safety issues related to the porn industry.

Kerndt told the Associated Press that the county might impose a mandatory condom use rule for porn film performers. Cal-OHSA officials said the state’s worker safety laws don’t cover the adult film industry, but the work safety agency might be able to apply a general worker safety law on the industry.

One provision, put in place for nurses, calls for ...