Pornographic Film Actor - Pornographic Actors and STDs

Pornographic Actors and STDs

Because pornographic film making involves actual sexual activity, usually involving sex without condoms, pornographic actors are particularly vulnerable to sexually transmitted diseases. In a paper written by the LA Board of Public Health, officials claimed that among 825 performers screened in 2000–2001, 7.7% of females and 5.5% of males had chlamydia, and 2% overall had gonorrhea. These rates are much higher than in patients visiting family planning clinics, where chlamydia and gonorrhea rates were 4.0% and 0.7%, respectively. Between January 2003 and March 2005, approximately 976 performers were reported with 1,153 positive STD test results. Of the 1,153 positive test results, 722 (62.6%) were chlamydia, 355 (30.8%) were gonorrhea, and 126 (10.9%) were coinfections with chlamydia and gonorrhea. Less is known about the prevalence and risk of transmission of other STDs such as syphilis, herpes simplex virus, human papillomavirus, hepatitis B or C, trichomonal infection, or diseases transmitted through the fecal–oral route. The data collection of LA public health was criticized by adult industry sources on the grounds that most of those testing positive had never made an adult film-and were in fact being excluded from adult film acting until they had treated their STDs. Non-treatable STDs like HSV represent a difficult case: according to actress Chloe, "After you've been in this business for a while, you have herpes. Everyone has herpes."

The high rate of STDs in the adult film industry started to change in 1998 when major adult film producers started implementing a regular periodic testing program for adult film actors. In the 1980s, there was an outbreak of AIDS in the pornographic film industry and a number of deaths of erotic actors and this led to the creation of the Adult Industry Medical Health Care Foundation (AIM), which helped set up a voluntary standard in the U.S. adult film industry where erotic actors are tested for HIV, chlamydia and gonorrhea every 30 days, and hepatitis, syphilis and HSV twice a year. AIM claims that this program has reduced the rate of STDs among adult film actors to 20% that of the general population. These claims have been criticized by various public health authorities-but there have been no controlled studies that support the claims of public health authorities that AIM's testing approach is not working.