LOS ANGELES — A group hoping to place a measure before Los Angeles voters that would require porn actors to wear condoms during film shoots said Wednesday it has gathered more than 64,000 valid voter signatures, about 23,000 more than the law requires for the June ballot.

The measure is backed by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, a group that has made a number of unsuccessful legal efforts – through state legislation, lawsuits and complaints to regulators – to require condoms in adult films.

“We believe these performers deserve the health and safety protections already afforded them under existing law, and that all levels of government need to be involved in this workplace safety issue,” foundation President Michael Weinstein said.

To get on the city’s ballot, advocates must turn in 41,183 signatures. If passed, the measure would require porn producers to agree to have their actors use condoms in adult films shot in Los Angeles in order to obtain permits to film in the city.

The city’s San Fernando Valley is the heart of the multi-billion dollar American porn industry.

Critics say the measure’s obvious flaw is that many porn producers don’t seek such permits in the first place, and those who do would likely be forced underground.

The Free Speech Coalition, a trade association for the porn industry that has advocated for consistently testing adult film performers for sexually transmitted diseases, opposes mandatory condom regulations.

“History has shown us that regulating sexual behavior between consenting adults does not work,” spokeswoman Diane Duke said. “The best way to prevent the transmission of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections is by providing quality information and sexual health services.”

DUREX condoms are set to become scarce on the shelves after a disagreement between the brand’s owner and its Indian partner cut up to 60 per cent of supply, analysts say.

Rival Ansell is set to benefit from the feud, with sharemarket analysts tipping its earnings will rise by millions of dollars.

Durex is facing the condom shortages after India’s TTK Lig, which produces 50-60 per cent of the company’s condoms, ceased supply in May.

The halt is believed to be about a disagreement over Indian distribution rights between TTK Lig and Durex’s owner, England-based Reckitt Benckiser.

But a Durex spokeswoman said a disruption to Australian condom supplies was unlikely. Nevertheless, Citigroup analyst Alex Smith said Ansell was well-placed to pick up Durex’s lost sales, potentially gaining an extra $4 million in operating earnings in the first half of 2012.

”Industry sources suggest that the Indian supply disruption is beginning to result in supply shortages of Durex condoms at the retailer level,” Dr Smith said in a client note.

”Ansell’s Surat Thani plant [in Thailand] will likely have spare capacity from August and Ansell may choose to contract manufacture for Durex if terms are sufficiently scarce.”

Ansell shares climbed 9¢, or 0.7 per cent, to $13.79 yesterday.

Last month, a judge at the High Court in London refused to grant an emergency injunction to force TTK Lig to resume supplying the contraceptives, ruling the matter should be decided in an Indian court.

In his ruling, Justice George Mann said TTK Lig “has the claimants for the time being over a barrel and it knows it”.

Reckitt had already run out of some Durex stocks, he said.

A Durex spokeswoman said yesterday that Durex had several factories across the world and most of Australia’s condoms came from Thailand.

”Parts of the product range, which were being manufactured in India, are currently in the process of being moved to alternative facilities,” the spokeswoman said.

”As such, a disruption to supply or stock availability on retailers’ shelves is unlikely at this stage.”

With BLOOMBERG

Britain is facing a shortage of condoms following a dispute between leading brand Durex and its key supplier.

The news has sparked fears of an increase in sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies, as the NHS issued a statement warning of ‘disruption’ to the supply.

Sexual health expert Dr Malcolm Vandenburg said the shortage could put the safe sex message at risk, saying: ‘The fear is that if there is a shortage, young people will begin to have unprotected sex.

‘Once they get used to doing this may continue not to use condoms even when the supply is back to normal.’

The shortage has been caused by Indian firm TTK Lig halting its supply of condoms in a price dispute with Durex owner Reckitt Benckiser.

The Slough-based company launched a High Court bid to force TTK to resume supply, but the claim was rejected.

A spokesman said the company was ‘actively managing the situation to mitigate any damage’.

Durex is Britain’s most popular brand of condom, accounting for 40% of the market. TTK makes more than half of them.

For the Gentleman Who Spares No Expense: A $56 Box of Condoms

For the sophisticated bachelor whose tastes are très chic and equally expensive:

Suit by Ralph Lauren: $1200;

Movado Stainless Steel Watch: $695;

Crockett and Jones Oxford Shoe: $570;

1 box of Naked brand condoms: $56

Apparently, there’s a market for the man who can not only afford jewels, but can pamper (and protect) the family jewels with the Naked condoms. They sell for about what his date’s dinner would cost at a fancy bistro.

But according to The New York Post, a thinner, softer latex than its competitors’ “thin” brands; a sleeker hypallergenic lubricant; and a wrapper that took the company three years to develop are all behind the more pricey prophylactic. Still the opinions of the ladies still count. After all, increasing our swag factor is why we buy expensive clothes and accessories in the first place.

Asked by the Post why a guy should spend that much on a condom when less expensive brands do the same trick, Naked CEO Jud Ireland doesn’t even respond, but yields to his sister Marie for the answer: “Because I’d rather have sex with someone who has a Naked condom on than a Trojan,” she said. “The guy looks better, I think.”

(CBS) Plain-old condoms could soon be in for some stiff competition - in the form of new erection-enhancing prophylactics some are calling “Viagra condoms.”

The condoms contain a gel designed to help men maintain a firm erection, the Wall Street Journal reported. Some men have trouble maintaining an erection while using condoms, and that can cause condoms to slip off - raising the risk not only of unwanted pregnancy but also of catching or spreading a sexually transmitted disease.

In addition to helping men preserve their erections, the company behind the condoms says they make erections bigger, the Daily Mail reported.

The gel works by boosting blood flow to the penis, KDFW TV reported. It’s similar to a drug used to treat the heart condition angina. But are the condoms a good idea - or just a marketing gimmick?

Dr. Irwin Goldstein, a sexual medicine expert in San Diego and editor-in-chief of the Journal of Sexual Medicine, told CBS News in an email that erection-enhancing condoms are an “interesting” and “novel” idea. But, he said, they “will have to be proven to be safe and effective compared to oral PDE 5 inhibitors,” a reference to Viagra and similar medications for erectile dysfunction.

And, Goldstein said, it would be important to make sure that “the drug does not pass from the condom to the woman.”

The technology has been licensed to the company that owns the condom brand Durex, and regulators in Europe are coming close to approval of the condoms there, Portfolio.com reported.

Calls to the company’s U.S. headquarters went unanswered in time for this article. No word on when, or if, the condoms will be coming to the U.S.

With the nuclear disaster in Japan, many concerns have come up due to the possibility of Radiation and whether or not Condoms manufactured in Japan may be contaminated with Radiation.

According to the people at CondomDepot.com, one of the only condoms sold in North America that are made in japan are the Kimono Brand of Latex Condoms.  According to them “Current inventory was purchased and arrived before the nuclear situation in Japan” and “once we sell all of our existing inventory we will not sell any Japanese products, re-evaluate the situation and wait for information from the FDA”. John Fidi added, “My number one concern is the safety of my warehouse employees and my customers.”

What we take out of this conversation is that it is too early to tell if any condom you are using ( and any product manufactured in Japan ) may have unsafe levels of radiation. For obvious reasons a condom that is radioactive in any way or shape could cause serious cancer risks when inserted into any part of the human body.

At the time of this post we would rather air on the side of caution and just stay away from any condom that came from Japan.

Stem cell transplant ‘cures’ Aids patient

The man, who is in his 40s, had a blood stem cell transplant in 2007 to treat leukaemia. His donor not only was a good blood match but also had a gene mutation that confers natural resistance to HIV.

Treatment has beat back HIV for 3 years but may be too risky, impractical for widespread use.

By Steve Reinberg
HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, Dec. 15 (HealthDay News) — In a rare case, a man living in Germany who had both leukemia and AIDS no longer has any detectable HIV cells in his blood following a stem cell transplant for his leukemia three years ago.

But experts were quick to caution that the case does not have practical implications for the treatment of AIDS worldwide.

As it turns out, the donor for that transplant carried a rare mutation in a gene that increases immunity against the most common form of HIV. First reported in 2009, this follow-up study, published online in the journal Blood, confirms that the recipient patient is still free of both leukemia and HIV three years after the transplant.

But one expert issued strong words of caution in interpreting the finding.

“Our phones have been ringing off the hook,” said Dr. Margaret Fischl, director of the AIDS clinical research unit at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. “We are having patients calling us and asking if they can stop their antiretroviral therapy — and the answer is uncategorically no.”

The theory is that if you could wipe out every infected cell you could cure HIV, Fischl said, but this is a unique case.

The patient had intense chemotherapy and radiation, then relapsed and was given a second transplant from the same donor. The donor was unique in that he had a gene that could fight the most common form of HIV. This mutation is seen in about one in every million people, Fischl explained.

“How much did a second transplant contribute to the slow takeover of the donor cells that are resistant to one form of HIV? The extent that that happened is remarkable,” she said.

However, this patient also was infected with another form of HIV as well, Fischl said. “What they are hoping is that the chemotherapy and radiation therapy wiped out that form, too. Could that patient still rebound with HIV in the future? Yes,” she said.

This treatment also carries with it a 30 percent risk of death, Fischl added.

“That he was young and got through it is quite remarkable,” she said. “I would never give this to a healthy patient. I could never justify it. If you use this therapy, 30 percent of your patients could die from the intervention.”

Fischl said the study does present new ways to look for an HIV cure, however. “This is leading to looking at gene therapy in a totally different way,” she said.

“We tell our patients that this was a very particular situation. What made this work was that he got a very rare donor. It opens doors for us, but we are years away from potentially making gene therapy more broadly available,” Fischl said. “It shows us the hurdles we have to get over to get to the cure.”

Back in 2009, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said the procedure was too expensive and risky to become either common practice or a “cure,” but noted it might help in the development of gene therapies to treat HIV.

Conservative U.S. Catholics think media, papal spokesman have skewed pope’s message.

RACHEL ZOLL -  AP Religion Writer

NEW YORK — Faced with a changing outlook from Pope Benedict XVI on condoms and their role in preventing the spread of HIV, many prominent conservative Roman Catholics in the U.S. are rejecting the Vatican’s own explanation of what the pope said.

Several orthodox Catholics said they would accept only a more formal papal pronouncement. Others insisted that journalists were purposely misrepresenting Benedict’s comments. Some questioned whether the papal spokesman, the Rev. Frederico Lombardi, accurately quoted the pope.

Bishops and the experts who advise them were scrambling to make sense of the news.

“It’s a mess,” said John Haas, president of the National Catholic Bioethics Center in Philadelphia, which advises church leaders, hospitals and Vatican offices. “I’m not ready to say that the pope said what Lombardi said.”

The uproar is over comments Benedict made in the new book, “Light of the World: The Pope, the Church and the Signs of the Times.” In an exchange with the author about AIDS in Africa, Benedict said that for some people, such as male prostitutes, using condoms could be a step in assuming moral responsibility because the intent is to “reduce the risk of infection.”

At a news conference Tuesday in Rome, Lombardi said Benedict knew his comments would provoke intense debate, and that the pope meant for his remarks to apply not just to male prostitutes, but also “if you’re a man, a woman, or a transsexual.”

The pope did not suggest using condoms as birth control, which is banned by the Roman Catholic Church, and said condoms were not a “real or moral solution” to the AIDS crisis.

Still, his remarks were a watershed in the long debate among theologians and church officials over the morality of using condoms for disease prevention.

Jenn Giroux, executive director of Human Life International America, which promotes Catholic teaching on contraception, abortion and other moral issues, said more clarification from the Vatican was needed.