Tag: CNN
Gay ‘chemsex’ is fueling HIV epidemics in Europe, experts warn
Chemsex refers to the use of drugs such as crystal meth to enhance sexual arousal and performance. Experts say it’s pervasive in some European cities.
A surge in “chemsex” parties, where people spend days getting high on drugs and having sex with scores of partners, is re-fueling epidemics of HIV among gay men in European towns and cities, doctors say.
Despite much higher risks of contracting the virus that causes AIDS, as well as other sexually transmitted infections (STIs), users search online “hook-up” apps like Grindr for tags such as “high and horny” or “party and play” to find others wanting drug-heightened and often anonymous and unprotected sex.
The result, AIDS experts say, is that in cities across Europe, HIV is spreading rapidly among men who have sex with men – leading to concentrated epidemics in hard-to-reach groups.
“Chemsex is very pervasive now – it’s a growing phenomenon,” said Rusi Jaspal, a professor of psychology and sexual health at De Montfort University in the British city of Leicester who has been studying the spread of HIV and the chemsex scene.
At a London conference hosted by the International Association of Providers of AIDS Care (IAPAC), the group’s president Jose Zuniga, described chemsex as a “challenge of proportions we cannot fully comprehend at this time”.
Chemsex is characterized by the use of drugs such as crystal meth, mephedrone and GHB, or gamma-hydroxybutyric acid, to enhance sexual arousal, performance and pleasure.
A subset of chemsex is known as “slamsex”, where partygoers self-inject drugs rather than taking them as pills or via pipes.
The drugs “reduce inhibitions and increase feelings of horniness or lust”, Jaspal said, and contribute to “a perfect storm” in groups with high HIV rates for the virus to spread.
In a small study published in 2014 of people attending HIV clinics in England and Wales, 30% of HIV-positive men surveyed reported chemsex in the previous year, and 10% said they’d engaged in slamsex.
HIGH-RISK BEHAVIOR
Ignacio Labayen de Inza, a chemsex specialist who works at several UK clinics and online as a counsellor for men seeking help, says “things have got much worse” since then.
“It’s not just a UK thing,” he told Reuters during the IAPAC conference. “It’s in Amsterdam, Berlin, Munich, Rome, Kiev, Moscow, Helsinki – and in many of what people call ‘gay destinations’, like (Spain’s) Ibiza, Torremolinos, the Canary Islands.”
A Spain-based study last year found that of almost 750 HIV-positive men surveyed, 60 percent reported having unprotected anal sex and 62 percent had been diagnosed with an STI. Rates of infections and high-risk sexual behavior were higher among the 30 percent who reported having engaged in chemsex or slamsex.
Globally, the fight against HIV and AIDS has made dramatic progress in the past decade. According to the UNAIDS agency, 1.7 million people were newly infected with HIV in 2018, a 16% drop since 2010, driven mostly by reducing HIV rates in Africa.
But progress is stalling and the epidemic is tightening its grip in key groups. UNAIDS says more then half of new HIV cases in 2018 were in minority or marginalized groups such as men who have sex with men, transgender people and sex workers.
The human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS can’t be cured, but can be kept in check for decades with cocktails of highly effective antiviral medicines. It’s partly this advance that is behind the high-risk practice of chemsex, said de Inza.
“People are not scared any more of HIV,” he said. “Many people I see say they think ‘it’s only a matter of time anyway, so I might as well have some fun’.”
Shannon Hader, deputy director of UNAIDS, says the key to limiting chemsex and its consequences is to get the right protection messages and methods to those who need them.
Encouraging use of HIV prevention drugs known as PrEP, or pre-exposure prophylaxis, is one effective step, she said, and can give people who have chemsex some control over their health.
“In this epidemic, we always have to be looking for what’s coming next that we’re not addressing,” she told Reuters. “And with PrEP, we need to ensure we’re not missing people in the chemsex environment.”
Article via CNN
An amputee says he was left ‘crawling across the floor’ after airline security confiscated his scooter batteries
Article via CNN
(CNN) – A Canadian amputee is petitioning to have his case heard by the Canadian Human Rights Commission after officials at a Calgary airport confiscated the batteries needed to power his portable scooter, according to CNN affiliate CBC. Stearn Hodge lost his left arm and right leg in a workplace accident in 1984 and uses a scooter powered by lithium batteries to get around. He can wear a prosthetic leg, but not for long because of the risk of infection, according to the outlet.
In 2017, Hodge was traveling to Tulsa, Oklahoma, with his wife for their 43rd wedding anniversary when a security agent at the Calgary International Airport and a representative from United Airlines told him it was unsafe to fly with his scooter’s $2,000 battery and its spare.
Hodge was prepared and presented documents he’d printed from the International Air Transport Association (IATA), that said that while there is a risk of fire hazard with Lithium-ion batteries, the association’s global standards make exceptions for the medical devices of travelers with disabilities if the airlines gives prior approval, the outlet reported. He had that approval, he told CBC.
But Hodge told the network that no one would listen to him or read the documents.
“I still remember the CATSA agent saying, ‘Well, you could get a wheelchair.’ How’s a one-armed guy going to run a wheelchair?” Hodge told the outlet. “How am I going to go down a ramp and brake with one hand? But that shouldn’t even have to come up.”
The Canadian Air Transit Security Authority declined to comment, citing pending litigation.
When Hodge asked a United Airlines representative to confirm for security that he had gotten permission to bring the batteries on board, CBC reported, the agent sided with security.
Airline: Experience ‘falls far short of our own high standard’
“We are looking into the allegations, and because of the pending litigation, we are unable to provide further comment,” Andrea Hiller, a spokeswoman for United Airlines, told CNN. “That said, the experience described falls far short of our own high standard of caring for our customers. We are proud of the many steps we have taken over the past few years to exhibit more care for our customers and we are proud to operate an airline that doesn’t just include people with disabilities but welcomes them as customers.”
Without the batteries to power his scooter, Hodge told CBC he spent much of his three-week vacation confined to his bed and was left to crawl when he needed to get around.
“An anniversary is supposed to be all about remembering how you fell in love … and keeping that magic alive,” he said, according to the network. “And those things were denied. I’m crawling across the floor and it is pathetic.”
On May 9, Hodge’s lawyer, John Burns, will ask a Federal Court judge to compel the Canadian Human Rights Commission to review the case.The matter was previously presented to the commission, but last September it was was referred to the Canadian Transportation Authority, which has no power to award general damages, according to CBC.The Canadian Human Rights Act allows for up to $20,000 in damages for each count of pain and suffering, and up to another $20,000 if the discrimination is “willful or reckless,” CBC reported.”
People with disabilities should be taken seriously. You don’t take away somebody’s legs and then describe it as an inconvenience. No, this is an injury,” Burns told CBC.
Check out some Lovelyti videos:
Jess Hilarious responds to R@cism Claims~ After Saying She Was ‘Nervous’ About Muslims on Her Plane
Video Of A Passenger dragged off overbooked United flight goes viral!
Ratchet FL~Woman SCREAMS and accuses airline employee of R@p3 after her flight gets CANCELLED
Stanford expels student involved in admissions bribery scandal ($500,000 donation to sailing program)
Article via CNN
Stanford University expelled a student who put false material in their college application and was linked to a $500,000 donation from the charity at the heart of the college admissions scam.”
We determined that some of the material in the student’s application is false, and, in accordance with our policies, have rescinded admission,” Stanford said in an update on its website. “Any credits earned have also been vacated. The student is no longer on Stanford’s campus.”
The student is not named in the statement or in court documents.
Stanford sailing coach John Vandemoer pleaded guilty last month to conspiracy to commit racketeering for arranging bribes of $110,000 and $160,000 to the sailing program in exchange for falsely designating two applicants as sailing recruits. Neither of the students had competitive sailing experience, the criminal complaint states.
The money was funneled from wealthy parents to a charity run by Rick Singer, who then directed the payments to Vandemoer, according to the complaint.
However, neither of those students completed the application process, so neither were admitted nor enrolled at the school, Stanford said.
A third student, though, was associated with a contribution to Stanford’s sailing program from the charity central to the scam, known as Key Worldwide Foundation, Stanford said.
“The contribution was made several months after the student was admitted to Stanford. The student had no recommendation from the former sailing coach, or any other coach, and has not at any time had an affiliation with the Stanford sailing program or any other Stanford athletic team,” Stanford said.
Stanford said KWF contributed a total of $770,000 to the sailing program in the form of three separate gifts. Given that the two students who did not enroll were associated with gifts of $110,000 and $160,000 to the sailing program, the third student was therefore associated with a gift of $500,000.
Stanford is the second school to expel a student as part of the fallout of the college admissions scam. Yale University kicked out a student two weeks ago whose family paid $1.2 million to get her admitted as a fake soccer player.
Check out some Lovelyti videos:
Aunt Becky caught in college admission scandal~paid $500k to get her daughter into USC
Dr. Dre BRAGS About Daughter Getting Into USC ‘All on Her Own,’ Then Remembers $70 Million Donation
Barbaric Barbie ARRESTED & EXPELLED After trying to Poison Roommate #JusticeForJazzy
Missionaries and nurses trapped in Haiti as protests sweep country
Article via CNN
A group of 24 Canadian missionaries and another of nurses are among visitors stranded in Haiti by ongoing street protests sweeping through the Caribbean country.The missionaries have been confined to their compound in Grand Goâve, an area roughly 50 kilometers away from capital city Port-au-Prince, after nearby roads littered with burning tires were blocked, according to a statement from their group Haiti ARISE.”We have nowhere to go, roads are blocked, rioting all over the streets and businesses are being destroyed,” a man referred to as Marc says in a video posted on the group’s Facebook page. “We do have a team here and we have been trying to get them out and it has been totally impossible,” he adds.Haiti has been gripped by protests and unrest for more than a week, as demonstrators calling for the country’s president to resign over soaring inflation and allegations of corruption have set cars ablaze and clashed with police.
Several people have been killed in the clashes, according to local media reports.Meanwhile, an additional group of eight Canadian who were also trapped inside their charity’s compound have secured a helicopter to take them out of the country. The nurses started a crowdfunding appeal this week, asking the public to “help us escape.””The director of the compound has instructed us not to go outside,” Tracy Hotta, one of the trapped nurses, told CNN, adding that the nurses are safe inside.
“They’re very destitute down here,” she added on the reasons for the protests. “They have zero healthcare… they’re taking desperate measures to try and make a change for themselves.”The helicopter secured will take the nurses directly to Port-au-Prince from the compound.”We are stranded here because we are about an hour away from Port-au-Prince where the violent protest is and they have set up barriers on the roads to get to the airports,” the women had written in their GoFundMe appeal, which surpassed its target by raising $16,000. “It is unlikely we will pass those barriers without being harmed,” they added.Because of the Canadian Embassy closure in Haiti, their calls to the embassy have been redirected to Ottawa and have gone unanswered, they note.The US and Canadian governments have warned people not to travel to Haiti due to crime and civil unrest. The Canadian government has issued a travel advisory saying: “avoid all travel to Haiti” and closed their embassy Friday for “security reasons” according to Canada’s Foreign Policy account on Twitter.
An additional group of 113 Canadian tourists stranded at a beach resort are also scheduled to be evacuated on Saturday.President Jovenel Moise was defiant in a televised address on Thursday, rejecting calls to resign and saying he “will not leave the country in the hands of armed gangs and drug traffickers.”
R. Kelly announces overseas tour
Article via CNN
Embattled singer R. Kelly announced new tour dates in a tweet Tuesday, but the tweet was later deleted.The announcement promised shows in Australia, New Zealand and Sri Lanka.
No further details were offered.
The singer has been embroiled in renewed controversy in the wake of the recent Lifetime docuseries “Surviving R. Kelly,” which chronicles allegations of abuse, predatory behavior and pedophilia against the singer.
Kelly has consistently denied the allegations, some of which date back decades.
Kelly’s attorney Steve Greenberg told CNN Wednesday he does “not believe that is accurate,” when asked about the tour announcement.
In 2017, the #MuteRKelly movement began to encourage radio stations to stop playing the singer’s music.
Since then it has expanded to protesting Kelly’s shows and calling on various businesses, including RCA Records, Spotify and Apple Music to stop doing business with the singer.
Last month, Kelly and Sony — the parent company of Kelly’s record label, RCA Records — reportedly agreed to part ways. The singer has continued to book shows in recent months.
In November, the Tampa Bay Times reported that a planned protest of the Kelly’s concert on the campus of the University of South Florida never materialized.
“If there’s anybody in here that feels they are going to be offended tonight, they need to leave, because it’s about to get freakier than a mother,” the paper reported the Grammy-winning artist as saying during his show.
Kelly’s announcement of his new shows was met with both anger and support.
“Hopefully Kelz will do a tour here in Chicago or the USA he has fans who know he is #survivingGroupieLies,” one person tweeted. German company Eventim has promoted two concerts for Kelly in Germany in April.
Check out some Lovelyti videos:
Documentaries & Discussions~Ep 7. Surviving R.kelly
Aaliyah’s mom says R. Kelly’s former backup singer is LYING!!+Surviving R. Kelly review
Rkelly dropped by Sony+ Numerous Surviving R. Kelly “victims” go on a press tour?
3 men get at least 25 years in prison in Kansas plot to kill Somali Muslims
Article via CNN
Three men were sentenced Friday to at least 25 years in federal prison for attempting to blow up an apartment complex in western Kansas where Somali Muslims lived, a plot that unnerved that refugee community.Patrick Eugene Stein and Curtis Allen of Kansas and Gavin Wright of Oklahoma chose the apartment complex in Garden City, a city of 26,000, partly because it contained a mosque, authorities said.
“Today’s sentence is a significant victory against hate crimes and domestic terrorism,” acting US Attorney General Matthew Whitaker said in a news release Friday from the Justice Department.“The defendants in this case acted with clear premeditation in an attempt to kill innocent people on the basis of their religion and national origin. That’s not just illegal — it’s morally repugnant.” The Somalis — who settled in Garden City because of employment in the meatpacking industry — appreciate the support they’ve received in the town and do not intend to harm anyone, according to one woman who spoke after the sentences were handed down.”Please, we need peace and love,” said Ifrah Farah, a member of the Somali community, according to CNN affiliate KWCH in Wichita. “Because we came here for better lives. We are refugees. We live here. We are not bad people. We love everybody.”
Justice Department: A confidential source saved lives
The three men were found guilty in April on one count of conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction and one count of conspiracy to violate the housing rights of their intended victims.The jury also convicted Wright of lying to the FBI in a matter involving domestic terrorism.
During the trial, prosecutors said the men began plotting an attack after the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting in Florida, KCWH reported.
The men referred to Muslims as cockroaches and, in the words of prosecutors, “described in the most extreme and violent terms what they planned to do to them.” The FBI conducted an eight-month investigation. The three defendants held several meetings to discuss their plan and took “significant steps — including making and testing explosives,” according to the US government.”
A confidential source, whom the government credited for thwarting the attack and saving the lives of innocent victims, recorded numerous conversations during which the defendants discussed and refined their plan,” the Justice Department said.
“As the plan solidified, the defendants discussed obtaining four vehicles, filling them with explosives, and parking them at the four corners of the apartment complex to create an explosion that would be sure to level the building and kill its occupants.
“Stein met with an undercover FBI agent in an effort to obtain a bomb, the department said. The agent posed as a black market arms dealer.On Friday, Allen was sentenced to 25 years, while Wright got 26 years and Stein 30 years.”
Today’s sentencing speaks to the FBI’s commitment to protect the communities we serve and our continued obligation to disrupt plots where the intent is to commit violence and harm others,” said Darrin Jones, special agent in charge of the FBI Kansas City Division.
Defense attorney points to Trump’s rhetoric
Jim Pratt, Stein’s attorney, had asked for a more lenient sentence for his client because of Donald Trump’s rhetoric during the 2016 presidential campaign and the public mood against Muslims. Pratt told CNN he’d never seen anything like the lead-up to the 2016 elections.
“It wasn’t just the rhetoric of Trump, who ahead of the election called for a ban against all Muslims entering the US, but it was the rhetoric of everybody that put fear into the system and made people believe that if Trump won, on the first day he’d take office, the world was going to implode,” he said.
“Or if he won, martial law was going to be declared and Hillary (Clinton) was going to be put into office.”
Such language fueled hysteria in people like Stein who had been “lost and ignored,” Pratt wrote in a sentencing memo filed in federal court in October.
The men wanted to time their attack at the Garden City apartment complex for the day after the 2016 election. But because Trump won, the men — who had been arrested a month earlier — may not have gone through with their plan, Pratt said.
“Trump’s win changed everything, and it is reasonable to speculate that it would have changed things among the defendants as well,”the filing said. “The urgency for action would be gone. The feeling of a losing battle would be gone.”
A man was found dead at Democratic donor Edward Buck’s home. It’s not the first time.
A man was found dead at the home of prominent Democratic donor Edward Buck in West Hollywood early Monday morning, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said. It’s the second death of an adult male at Buck’s home in the last couple years. In July 2017 a man identified as Gemmel Moore was determined to have fatally overdosed at the same location, authorities said. Buck, 64, was present at the time of both incidents.
Now police are conducting an investigation of Monday’s death as well as follow-up interviews and a secondary review of the 2017 death to better understand the two cases, authorities said.
Deputies responded to the home at 1:05 a.m. Monday regarding a person not breathing. They pronounced the man dead when they arrived, the Sheriff’s Department said. The cause of death is unknown and will be determined by the Los Angeles County Department of Medical Examiner-Coroner.
The death of Moore, a 26-year-old black man, in July 2017 was determined to be an accidental methamphetamine overdose, the Department of Medical Examiner-Coroner’s website says.
The admissible evidence in the case was insufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Buck was responsible for Moore’s death, according to a charge evaluation worksheet from the LA County District Attorney in July 2018. The admissible evidence was also insufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he furnished drugs to Moore or that he possessed drugs, the document states.
The Los Angeles LGBT Center, an organization that provides services and advocates for LGBT people, called on the Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva to fully investigate the latest death and “aggressively seek justice.”
“Although the investigation is in its early stages, we urge Sheriff Villanueva to keep the public fully informed as LGBT people have a considerable and urgent interest in a case that is so clearly linked to the health and safety of our community,” the statement said. “The reports we have heard provide more questions than answers.
“Buck’s attorney, Seymour Amster, told CNN that Buck and the victim had been friends for over 25 years. He said he did not believe there would be charges filed in the case.
“Yes, Ed does have individuals he associates with who have problems with drugs. He tries to talk them out of it. Sometimes they bring their problems into his apartment, and that’s where the problem is,” Amster said.Buck has donated to a number of Democratic candidates and PACs in recent years, according to information from OpenSecrets, a nonpartisan group that tracks money in US politics. In 2017, he gave $10,400 to the Getting Stuff Done PAC affiliated with Democratic Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, $2,700 to Rep. Ted Lieu of California, and $1,000 each to Rep. Jimmy Gomez of California, Rep. Pete Aguilar of California, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi of Illinois, and former Sen. Joe Donnelly of Indiana.
He also previously gave $2,700 to Hillary Clinton in 2015, $5,000 to the House Majority PAC that supports Democrats in 2014, and $1,000 to Barack Obama in 2008, according to OpenSecrets.In 2010, Buck heckled California Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman at a political event, according to news reports from NJ.com at the time. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who was campaigning for Whitman, then confronted Buck.
“It’s people who raise their voices and yell and scream like you that are dividing this country,” Christie said. “We’re here to bring this country together, not to divide it.”
Article via CNN
