Sexually Transmitted Infections Increase HIV Risk for Homosexual Men

Excerpted from Sexually Transmitted Infections Increase HIV Risk for Gay Men, by Michael Carter, published August 23, 2006, on aidsmap.com:

Certain sexually transmitted infections in the anus increase the risk of gay men becoming infected with HIV, according to research conducted in Sydney and presented to the Sixteenth International AIDS Conference in Toronto last week. In a separate study, the same team of investigators also found that gay men who were infected with herpes simplex virus-1 (HSV-1) were at a greater of risk of becoming infected with HIV.

There is epidemiological evidence suggesting a connection between sexually transmitted infections and the risk of HIV infection. It is therefore thought that preventing sexually transmitted infections could would also help to reduce the number of new HIV infections. Few studies have looked at the connection between sexually transmitted infections and the risk of becoming HIV-positive in gay men. Investigators from the Health in Men (HIM) study in Sydney, Australia, therefore conducted a prospective study involving over 1,400 HIV-negative gay men.