CDC: Officials Warn Coronavirus Outbreaks Likely in the U.S.

A woman in Milan, Italy where a coronavirus outbreak has occurred.

While Donald Trump and his sycophants are ignoring the advise of experts and saying that the coronavirus has been contained and that no outbreaks are likely in the USA, medical experts are telling a very different story.  Indeed, some are saying that Americans need to be prepared for major disruptions with schools closed, businesses shut down, and potentially areas quarantined.  From its huge drop over the last two days - roughly 1900 points - the stock market is believing the medical experts and not the liar-in-chief in the White House.  Just as disturbing is the reality that the Trump/Pence regime has been cutting funding to the CDC and eliminating health officials who speak the truth based on scientific fact and knowledge during the regime's misrule.  A piece in the New York Times looks at what medical experts are saying in contrast to the lies of the Trump/Pence regime.  Here are article excerpts:

Federal health officials starkly warned on Tuesday that the new coronavirus will almost certainly spread in the United States, and that hospitals, businesses and schools should begin making preparations.

“It’s not so much of a question of if this will happen anymore but rather more of a question of exactly when this will happen,” Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said in a news briefing.

She said that cities and towns should plan for “social distancing measures,” like dividing school classes into smaller groups of students or closing schools altogether. Meetings and conferences may have to be canceled, she said. Businesses should arrange for employees to work from home.

“We are asking the American public to work with us to prepare, in the expectation that this could be bad,” Dr. Messonnier said.

Shortly after the news conference, stock markets plummeted for the second day as investors dumped stocks and turned to the safety of government bonds. The S&P 500 fell by more than 3 percent, following a 3.4 percent slide on Monday — the worst day for the American markets since February 2018.

In contrast to his own health officials, President Trump, traveling in India, played down the threat, saying, “You may ask about the coronavirus, which is very well under control in our country.”

[G]iven the outbreaks in more than two dozen countries, officials at the C.D.C. seemed convinced that the virus’s spread in the United States was inevitable, although they did not know whether the impact would be mild or severe.

“We cannot hermetically seal off the United States to a virus,” Alex M. Azar II, the secretary of health and human services, told a Senate panel on Tuesday. “And we need to be realistic about that.”

Globally, public health officials are confronting a multipronged threat. China’s battle to contain the epidemic has shown signs of success, with a plunge in the rate of new infections.

But this has been overshadowed by new clusters of infections in Iran, South Korea and Italy. The emergence of these new hubs underscored the lack of a coordinated global strategy to combat the coronavirus, which has infected nearly 80,000 people in 37 countries, causing at least 2,600 deaths.

In Iran, a spike in coronavirus infections — including to the top health official in charge of fighting the disease — has prompted fears the contagion may spread throughout the Middle East. In Italy, one of Europe’s largest economies, officials are struggling to prevent the epidemic from paralyzing the commercial center of Milan.

[L]awmakers from both the Democratic and the Republican parties grilled Mr. Azar and other members of the administration at the Senate hearing, apparently unconvinced that the Trump administration was prepared for the outbreak that the C.D.C. is forecasting.

Senator John Kennedy, Republican of Louisiana, grew exasperated when the acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, Chad F. Wolf, could not say how many people were expected to become infected.

Senator Patty Murray, Democrat of Washington, asked the health secretary whether he thought the United States currently had enough health masks in stock.

Hospital officials were assuming the efforts to contain the virus would delay, not prevent, a pandemic — sustained transmission of the coronavirus on more than one continent.

“We are really staging it, from a minor issue of small numbers of patients, to a full-blown community spread,” said Dr. Mark Jarrett, the chief quality officer at Northwell Health, which operates 23 hospitals on Long Island and elsewhere in New York.

Hospital administrators nationwide anticipate a wave of patients that could strain their intensive care units and isolation rooms. Many are starting to conserve medical supplies, including specialized masks and ventilators.

W.H.O. officials have also warned that the world is unprepared for a leap in infections, which could overwhelm medical resources in many countries. They also cautioned that new cases could suddenly resurge in China, as the government struggles to get people back to work.

And there are persistent doubts about the accuracy of infection figures reported by the Chinese government, raising the possibility that the true magnitude of the outbreak remains under reported.   

Pharmaceutical Giant Makes Billions from HIV Treatment Funded by Taxpayers

I have touched on this topic before, but it bears addressing again since Donald Trump, a/k/a Der Trumpenführer, has again declared war on the Affordable Health Care Act and seeks to throw the general public at the mercy of greedy insurance carriers and even greedier pharmaceutical companies.  The preferred Trump/GOP health care system is one that maximizes profits to insurance companies, for profit health care providers and greed driven pharmaceutical companies and says to hell with average Americans and taxpayers other than the very wealthy.  A piece in the Washington Post looks at the obscene profits - $3 billion last ear - being raked in by Gilead Sciences on a drug that was developed at taxpayer expense and patented by the federal government  Something is seriously wrong with this picture even before one considers the fact that the high prices charged by Gilead makes the drug unobtainable for many who need it.  While the drug that is the subject of the article is HIV related, the same ridiculous screwing over of American taxpayers/consumers applies to many other drugs as well.  Here are article highlights (Note: (i) Gilead has made $36.2 billion off a government funded drug; and (ii) the same drug which cost $3,000/month in the USA costs $200 in the United Kingdom):

Thomas Folks spent years in his U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lab developing a treatment to block deadly HIV in monkeys. Then San Francisco AIDS researcher Robert Grant, using $50 million in federal grants, proved the treatment worked in people who engaged in risky sex.

Their work — almost fully funded by U.S. taxpayers — created a new use for an older prescription drug called Truvada: preventing HIV infection. But the U.S. government, which patented the treatment in 2015, is not receiving a penny for that use of the drug from Gilead Sciences, ­Truvada’s maker, which earned $3 billion in Truvada sales last year.

Gilead argues that the government’s patents for Truvada for PrEP, as the prevention treatment is called, are invalid. And the government has failed to reach a deal for royalties or other concessions from the company — benefits that could be used to distribute the drug more widely.

The extraordinary standoff between the CDC and a drug company over patent rights raises a big question for the Trump administration: How aggressively should the government attempt to enforce its patents against an industry partner?

The Department of Health and Human Services, which includes the CDC and the National Institutes of Health, has patented more than 2,500 inventions created with taxpayer dollars since 1976, according to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

It routinely licenses new pharmaceutical compounds to private companies that take those publicly financed discoveries into the marketplace.

Gilead, which enjoys a U.S. monopoly on Truvada, charges between $1,600 and $2,000 for a month’s supply of a pill that can be manufactured for a fraction of that amount [actually about $0.6 per pill]. The number of new HIV infections in the United States has barely budged, meanwhile, and is stuck around 40,000 a year, according to CDC estimates.

Activists want the government to take a more aggressive stance against Gilead. Their complaints are part of a broader wave of anger over drug companies reaping hefty financial rewards by capitalizing on taxpayer-funded research.

“The CDC has all these patents, and is allowing Gilead to rip off the American people at the expense of public health,’’ said James Krellenstein, an HIV/AIDS activist and co-founder of the PrEP4All Collaboration, who has spent months digging into the government patents. Instead of enforcing its patent, Krellenstein said, the CDC is “twiddling their thumbs.’’

NIH and CDC officials see their role as encouraging the commercialization of government-financed discoveries, not placing curbs on them, Sukhatme said. That tends to take patent infringement lawsuits off the table. . . . But that stance increasingly is challenged by political anger over high drug prices. Consumer advocates and members of Congress have stepped up demands that the government exercise its rights under existing law to license generic competition or imports during shortages or unwarranted price spikes; several billswould enhance such “compulsory licensing’’ provisions.

The case of Gilead and Truvada for PrEP adds a new twist to these debates, with demands that the government be more aggressive in exercising its own patent to ease the cost effects of a monopoly.

After Truvada was shown to work as a prophylactic in primates, the CDC applied for its patents. That began a nine-year effort, using two outside law firms retained by the CDC, which made their case to U.S. Patent and Trademark Office examiners.

In addition to $50 million in government money, $17 million for the study came from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Grant said.

Federal officials estimated in 2016 that less than 10 percent of the 1.1 million people who should be on PrEP treatment are receiving the drug. Gilead says that has now improved to about 20 percent. The problem is particularly acute in Southern states, where cultural barriers and lack of education programs are holding back its use.

The CDC waged a successful defense of its patent in Europe, adding strength to its case that its patents are legitimate, Morten said.

“I have no reason to believe that these patents are not valid and enforceable, and moreover, they seem to be infringed [by Gilead] by the use of Truvada for PrEP,’’ Morten said in an interview. “These are public assets that were generated with public money that effectively are going to waste here.’’

In response to complaints about its price, Gilead said it offers discount coupons that reduce the cost to less than $5 for a monthly supply for patients who lack insurance. It says it has spent $138 million since 2012 on community grant programs to raise awareness and educate at-risk people. Gilead has earned $36.2 billion on Truvada since 2004, according to its annual reports.

Obtaining Gilead’s coupons for Truvada for PrEP is a cumbersome process, they said. If the CDC leveraged its patents to get money for Truvada, it could help cash-strapped state Medicaid programs undertake aggressive education and distribution programs. Virginia Medicaid said it pays $54.04 per pill, or $1,621.20 for a monthly course of treatment.

“What we’re seeing is that because city and local governments are spending so much on getting PrEP,’’ said HIV/AIDS activist Christian Urrutia, “they don’t have a lot of money left over to do these kinds of programs.’’ 

For the record, I have what is deemed "excellent" healthcare coverage and when I inquired about PrEP given the current controversy, I was advised that I would have to incur $3,600.00 in out of pocket expense before the coverage would reduce the cost.  Obviously, thousands of individuals do not have $3,600 lying around - and that assumes they have "excellent coverage", something most do not have.

Trump’s New CDC Director: AIDS Is ‘God’s Judgment’ Against Gays

Trump’s New CDC Director: AIDS Is ‘God’s Judgment’ Against Gays (Image via YouTube)

As noted frequently, the only demographic that Donald Trump, a/k/a Der Trumpenführer, seems to want to please is right wing evangelical Christian extremists.  From moving the American embassy to Jerusalem - to satiate evangelicals delusion that the move is key to sparking Armageddon - to filling his cabinet with Christofascists who want to destroy the public schools  (which, horror of horrors, teach science, evolution and fact based sex education) when not lining his own pockets, Trump is doing all that he can to keep evangelicals behind him.  Meanwhile, evangelicals have shown their moral bankruptcy by supporting a man who is anathema to true followers of Christ.  Now, Trump has thrown evangelicals another bone by appointing an anti-science, anti-LGBT zealot to the directorship of the Centers for Disease Control.  The new CDC director, Robert Redfield is on record as stating that AIDS is god's punishment to gays for not complying with Christofascist dogma.  Never mind that legitimate science and every legitimate medical and mental health association in America stands for the reality that gays' sexual orientation is "normal" and not a choice.  A piece in Patheos looks at this totally unfit Trump appointee.  Here are highlights:

Trump’s new CDC director, Dr. Robert Redfield, is a dangerous Christian extremist with a history of demonizing gays and single parents.

Dr. Robert Redfield, the new Director of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), has long standing ties with conservative Christian groups that are hostile to gays, single parents, and anyone else that offends their “family values.”

In the past, the new CDC director has worked closely with the Christian organization Americans for a Sound AIDS/HIV Policy. The group claims that AIDS was “God’s judgment” against gays, and was punishment from God for an America weakened by single-parent households and a loss of “family values.”

CNN reports on Redfield’s deplorable record:

As an Army major at Walter Reed Medical Institute, he designed policies for controlling the disease within the US military that involved placing infected personnel in quarantine and investigating their pasts to identify and track possible sexual partners. Soldiers were routinely discharged and left to die of AIDS, humiliated and jobless, often abandoned by their families. . . . . In other words, Redfield used his prominent position in the U.S. military to design a policy that would ultimately humiliate and punish gay soldiers suffering from the AIDS virus.

Foreign Policy reports on the disastrous effect of Redfield’s odious policy decisions:

The military seemed intent on administratively punishing infected soldiers for their HIV status. Soldiers described being summoned to meet with a chaplain, who would inform them that they had tested positive for HIV, and counsel them while military police rifled through their barracks searching for evidence of homosexuality and the names of possible sex partners. . . . . Anecdotally, many of these young men committed suicide, and most were drummed out of the military without medical coverage, dying impoverished from their AIDS disease…

More on the new CDC director’s deplorable record via CNN:

In the 1980s Redfield worked closely with W. Shepherd Smith, Jr. and his Christian organization, Americans for a Sound AIDS/HIV Policy, or ASAP. The group maintained that AIDS was “God’s judgment” against homosexuals, spread in an America weakened by single-parent households and loss of family values.

Redfield wrote the introduction to a 1990 book, “Christians in the Age of AIDS,” co-written by Smith, in which he denounced distribution of sterile needles to drug users and condoms to sexually active adults, and described anti-discrimination programs as the efforts of “false prophets.”

In the early 1990’s, ASAP and Redfield also backed H.R. 2788, a House bill sponsored by deeply conservative Rep. William Dannemeyer (R-California). It would have subjected people with HIV to testing, loss of professional licenses and would have effectively quarantined them.

[F]or Redfield, the new CDC director, the best way to prevent HIV is not a science-based program promoting clean needles and condoms; instead, the so-called scientist recommended a faith-based program built around abstinence and Jesus.

Bottom line: Trump’s new CDC director, Dr. Robert Redfield, is yet another dangerous Christian extremist holding a prominent position in the Trump administration.  Can you feel the creeping Christian theocracy?

Sadly, Redfield embodies the mind set of today's evangelicals and unfit and unqualified Christian extremists that Trump has elevated to cabinet positions and other high ranking positions.  Be very afraid.

CDC Lists ‘Fetus,’ ‘Transgender’, "Diversity", "Evidence Based" as Forbidden Words

One of the hallmarks of Nazi propaganda - when not vilifying targeted groups, especially Jews - was to work to erase people and terms from public discourse.  This effort went hand in hand with Adolph Hitler's and Joseph Goebbels' view (now practiced daily by Fox News and Breitbart), that if one lied often enough, the public would come to believe the lies as truth. Reports are now coming out that the Trump/Pence regime has directed the Center for Disease Control ("CDC") to cease using words that conflict with the regime's antiscience, anti-abortion, pro-discrimination agenda.  Two banned phrases sum this up: "evidence based" and "science based" are now verboten.  Along with this, of course, are other terms not popular with evangelical Christians and white supremacists, words like "diversity."  Frighteningly, just like in Germany as Hitler rose to power, much of the public is oblivious to what is happening.  The Daily Beast looks at this propaganda effort.  Here are excerpts:

Policy analysts working at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention were told on Thursday about a list of forbidden words being imposed by senior CDC officials, according to a report in The Washington Post. The forbidden words are reportedly “vulnerable,” “entitlement,” “diversity,” “transgender,” “fetus,” “evidence-based,” and “science-based.” Alison Kelly, a senior leader in the agency’s Office of Financial Services, reportedly led the meeting and did not say why the words were being banned.

The cited Washington Post story provides in part as follows:

In some instances, the analysts were given alternative phrases. Instead of "science-based" or ­"evidence-based," the suggested phrase is "CDC bases its recommendations on science in consideration with community standards and wishes," the person said. In other cases, no replacement words were immediately offered.

The question of how to address such issues as sexual orientation, gender identity and abortion rights — all of which received significant visibility under the Obama administration — has surfaced repeatedly in federal agencies since President Trump took office. Several key departments — including Health and Human Services, which oversees the CDC, as well as Justice, Education, and Housing and Urban Development — have changed some federal policies and how they collect government information about lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans.

HHS has also removed information about LGBT Americans from its website. The department's Administration for Children and Families, for example, archived a page that outlined federal services that are available for LGBT people and their families, including how they can adopt and receive help if they are the victims of sex trafficking.

The longtime CDC analyst, whose job includes writing descriptions of the CDC's work for the administration's annual spending blueprint, could not recall a previous time when words were banned from budget documents because they were considered controversial.

The reaction of people in the meeting was "incredulous," the analyst said. "It was very much, 'Are you serious? Are you kidding?' "  In my experience, we've never had any pushback from an ideological standpoint," the analyst said. 

"Community standards and wishes" is a indirect way of saying "Christofascist standards and wishes."  Be very afraid.

CDC: Half of Gay Black Men Will Get HIV; Where Are the Black Churches?

click image to enlarge

One of the subjects of my frequent venting episodes is the crisis going on in the black community with HIV infection and the fact that - at least in the Hampton Roads area of Virginia - the black churches and pastors are an obstacle to remedying the tragic situation.  Now, a recently released study by the Center for Disease Control ("CDC") that helps to quantify just how bad the crisis is in fact. As the image above shows, black men who have sex with other men have a 1 in 2 chance of contracting HIV/AIDS.    White gay men in contrast have a 1 in 11 chance of contracting HIV/AIDS.  But the problem is not limited to black men.  The same study found that black women have a 1 in 48 chance of contracting HIV/AIDS while among white women, the chance is 1 in 880.  Why the huge disparity?  In my view, it is simple.  The black community overall - and black churches and pastors in particular - remains extremely homophobic.  The result is men "on the down low" who secretly have sex with other men, often without engaging in safe sex practices, and those who should be tested failing to do so because of their fear of being discovered and the stigma that attaches in that community.  The other find?  That the risk of HIV/AIDS contraction is highest in the Bible Belt states.   Here are some study summary highlights:

A CDC study released in February 2016 provides the first-ever comprehensive national estimates of the lifetime risk of an HIV diagnosis for several key populations at risk and in every state. Overall, the likelihood that an American will be diagnosed with HIV at any point during his or her life is now 1 in 99, an improvement from a previous study using 2004-2005 data that reported lifetime risk at 1 in 78. Despite overall progress, this study reveals stark disparities by race, risk group and geography.

By Race/Ethnicity, African Americans Are at Greatest Risk: While studies have shown that African Americans do not engage in riskier sexual behavior compared to Americans of other races/ethnicities, African American men overall are almost 7 times more likely than white men to be diagnosed with HIV in their lifetimes. The disparity among women is even greater: 1 in 48 African American women will be diagnosed with HIV in their lifetimes, compared with 1 in 227 Hispanic women and 1 in 880 white women. Reasons for this higher lifetime risk include higher prevalence within the community, which poses an increased risk of infection with each sexual encounter; lack of access to healthcare; poverty; and stigma.

Lifetime Risk Is Higher for People in the Southern United States: People living in the South are more likely to be diagnosed with HIV over the course of their life than people in other parts of the country. States where risk is greatest include Maryland (1 in 49), Georgia (1 in 51), Florida (1 in 54), and Louisiana (1 in 56).

Bigotry and the embrace of religious based ignorance imposes a real harm on the lives of American citizens.  Sadly, the far right Christofascists care little or nothing about black citizens and, as some recent posts have indicated, many of them are racists who long for the days of Segregation and the Jim Crow laws. 

Gay West Hollywood Man Brain Dead from Bacterial Meningitis - New York Connection?

As several LGBT blogs are reporting, young, seemingly fit gay West Hollywood attorney, Brett Shaad (pictured at left) is brain dead from bacterial meningitis and for the time being is on life support.  At present, it is not known if he contracted it via someone from New York City where there has been an out break of bacterial meningitis in the gay community.  The purpose of this post is to underscore how critical it is that members of the LGBT community take this situation seriously and preferably get the vaccine against the disease.  This story sends shivers through me and revives old nightmares.  And for good reason.   And to me, it is criminal that the vaccine is not widely recommended.  The CDC in its wisdom believes that the risk is low and, therefore, the cost is not merited.  Stated another way, since the number of individuals who die each year is low, the CDC is willing to write off their lives as a cost control measure.  Anyone who has seen this disease first hand would NEVER be willing to just write off a given amount of lives as an acceptable reaction.

As long time readers likely recall, one of my daughters was stricken with bacterial meningitis almost 14 years ago and very nearly died.   While she had a miracle recovery - she was actually written up in the hospital's magazine after the roughly six month ordeal - many do not.   And what is the most frightening about the disease is the speed with which it strikes.  Often, by the time discernible symptoms are displaying (most noticeably a rash like phenomenon where capillaries in the skin begin to rupture), time is almost out to save the victim from either death or horrible impairment.  In the case of my daughter, another 10 to 15 minutes in getting her to the hospital and she probably would have died.   As it was, the hospital ER staff struggled to stabilize her and thankfully we were at a hospital with top trauma facilities and with staff who immediately recognized what they were dealing with.  I can still hear the doctor telling me to call my former wife and tell her to get to the hospital immediately, no shower, etc., because he did not know if they were going to be able to save my daughter.  Towleroad has some details on this sad situation and the, in my view, irresponsible manner in which the medical authorities are reacting.  Here are highlights:

Brett Shaad was declared brain dead but remained on life support Friday afternoon, said Elizabeth Ashford, a spokeswoman for Shaad’s family. She declined to release further details.

West Hollywood Councilman John Duran incorrectly said he had been taken off life support earlier on Friday, the wire adds:

Duran, who saw Shaad last weekend, described the openly gay man as being “robust and healthy” prior to Monday, when he began to feel sick.

On Wednesday, he went into the emergency room. By Thursday, he was in a coma.

Tests are underway on the strain of meningitis to determine if it is related to the deadly strain in NYC, against which health officials have urged sexually active gay men to be vaccinated.

It has not been determined how Shaad contracted meningitis. Shaad's family cricized Duran after he mentioned that Shaad attended the recent White Party in Palm Springs. Shaad also recently visited an Equinox gym in WeHo, the AP adds.

Symptoms typically develop within three to seven days of exposure and can include stiff neck, fever, headache, nausea, vomiting, increased sensitivity to light and an altered mental state, often confusion.

More info on meningitis and how it is spread here at the CDC.

According to WABC: "Vaccinations are not being widely recommended in Los Angeles County. But community agencies such as the L.A. Gay and Lesbian Center are urging individuals to take precautions."

Added Duran: “We don’t want to panic people. But we learned 30 years ago the consequences of delay in the response to AIDS. We are sounding the alarm that sexually active gay men need to be aware that we have a strain of meningitis that is deadly on our hands."

Our thoughts go out to Shaad's friends and family.

Likewise, my thoughts go out to Brett Shaad's family and friends.  I came withing not too many minutes of facing what they have had overwhelm them seemingly out of the blue.  

As an added note, some individuals are carriers of the disease and never show or develop symptoms themselves.  In my daughter's case, they were never able to tack her infection to anyone in particular, meaning that whoever had the bacteria was a carrier.   If in doubt, go to your doctor and get the vaccine even if you have to pay for it out of pocket.

CDC: LGBT Teens More Prone to Risky Behavior

The results of a new Centers for Disease Control report further confirms what we've heard before. Namely, that LGBT teens are more likely to engage in risky, health threatening behavior than their straight counterparts. Sadly, the report claims to "not know" what causes the more self-destructive behavior in LGBT teens. I suspect that we all know (as do the reports authors) the real cause: anti-gay societal bigotry against and incessant attacks by Christianists on LGBT citizens. Being constantly told one is evil, going to go to Hell, called a deviants - the whole litany of lies and hate that I and others in the LGBT blogosphere write about all the time - takes a heavy psychological toll. Worse yet, efforts to start GSA's and implement anti-bullying policies that would help these LGBT teens are consistently opposed by the modern day Pharisee of the Christian Taliban who want the special right to abuse and denigrate others. It's unfortunate that the survey questions utilized did not ask the question the researchers probably did not what to hear answered. Then it would have been harder to close one's eyes to the fruits of religious based hate and bigotry. Here are highlights from Huffington Post:
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Gay and bisexual high school students are more likely than their heterosexual classmates to smoke, drink alcohol or do other risky things, according to a government study released Monday.
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Based on anonymous surveys of 156,000 high school students, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study is the largest by the government to look at sexual orientation and behavior in teens. It echoes similar findings in some smaller studies.
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Gay, lesbian and bisexual students reported worse behavior in half to 90 percent of the risk categories, depending on the survey site. Why? CDC officials don't know for sure: The survey didn't ask kids why they smoked or attempted suicide or did other things that could be dangerous.
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But gay, lesbian and bisexual students deal with stigma, disapproval and social rejection. "Many risk behaviors are related to how people feel about themselves and the environment they're in," noted the study's lead author, Laura Kann of the CDC's division of adolescent and school health.
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About 4 to 10 percent of heterosexual students said they attempted suicide in the previous year. For gay and lesbian students: 15 percent to 34 percent. For bisexual students: 21 percent to 32 percent.
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It is far past time that the members of the Christian Taliban and professional Christian set be held accountable for the fruits of their foul handiwork. By not seeking the answer this important question, our enemies will take the report results and no doubt twist them around and use them as proof of the dangers of homosexuality.

Abstinance Only Sex Education Proves Ineffective Yet Again

A new Centers for Disease Control reports indicates that during the Chimperator's delusional reign when evangelicals drove sex education policy unwanted pregnancies and the transmission of STD's increased - in some case markedly. Sticking one's head in the sand and rejecting positive programs that have proven effective elsewhere is one of the signature idiocies of the Christianists. Science and objective reality are thrown in the trash bin as religious zealotry dictates all policy. Nor surprisingly, the Bible Belt region had the highest incidences of pregnancies and new HIV cases on a per capita basis. I hope Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention and the other professional Christians are proud of their handiwork. The larger public needs to roundly condemn the education policies of these flat earth types and let their elected officials know that they support a fact based comprehensive sex education policy in the schools. Here are some highlights from the Guardian:
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Teenage pregnancies and syphilis have risen sharply among a generation of American school girls who were urged to avoid sex before marriage under George Bush's evangelically-driven education policy, according to a new report by the US's major public health body. In a report that will surprise few of Bush's critics on the issue, the Centres for Disease Control says years of falling rates of teenage pregnancies and sexually transmitted disease infections under previous administrations were reversed or stalled in the Bush years. . . . The number of Aids cases in adolescent boys has nearly doubled.
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The CDC says that southern states, where there is often the greatest emphasis on abstinence and religion, tend to have the highest rates of teenage pregnancy and STDs.

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Although the CDC does not attribute a cause, groups that support comprehensive sex education have seized on the report as evidence of the failure of religiously-driven policies that shy away from teaching about contraception in favour of emphasising avoiding sexual contact. Planned Parenthood said the CDC report is "alarming" and confirms that teenagers need "medically accurate, age-appropriate, comprehensive sex education".

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The Christian Taliban has no place in setting sex education policy in the public schools. Ignorance is not the way to reduce unwanted pregnancies and STD's.