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So, there’s a new paranoia spreading about homosexual sex, and it’s link to disease. But is it justified? Not really.

On Monday, a team of researchers led by doctors from the University of California at San Francisco announced that gay men were “many times more likely than others” to acquire a new strain of drug-resistant staphylococcus, a nasty, fast-spreading and potential lethal bacteria known as MRSA USA300. And sure enough, the study, published online in the Annals of Internal Medicine, was quickly picked up by reporters round the world and across the Internet, including a London tabloid which dubbed the disease “the new H.I.V”

Well, then the crap kind’ve hit the fan, didn’t it? Because it opened the door for this-

The report also inadvertently offered ammunition for many antigay groups, including the conservative Concerned Women for America, which issued a release on Wednesday citing the “sexual deviancy” of gay men as leading to AIDS, syphilis and gonorrhea.

“The medical community has known for years that homosexual conduct, especially among males, creates a breeding ground for often deadly disease,” the release read.

Another group, Americans for Truth About Homosexuality, also cited the report as a way of proving that “homosexual behavior is unhealthy.”

“Why aren’t all schoolchildren being taught that there are special health risks associated with homosexual behavior and that they should ‘just say no’ to homosexuality?” read a released posted on the group’s Web site.

Of course… what they’re not looking at is the fact that it’s not caused by sexual activity, nor is it carried exclusively by homosexuals.

Indeed, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, which helped finance the study, affirmed on Wednesday that the disease was not sexually transmitted or limited to a certain type of person. It is transmitted through skin-to-skin contact, the agency said in a statement, and is widespread in hospitals and among hospital workers.

“These infections occur in men, women, adults, children and persons of all races and sexual orientations,” the statement read, adding that while the particular strain identified in the report had been found in gay men, it had also been found in people who were not gay.

So, a study in Atlanta finds that all sorts of people, regardless of orientation carry this strain of the disease, while a study of 9 hospitals in SFrancisco finds a higher population of gay men with it. Did anyone think to maybe consider the size of the homosexual population in San Francisco around these hospitals? I mean, maybe I’m just going on media influenced assumptions here… but it might have something to do with it. I dunno.

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