Police seek to ban condoms from saunas in Edinburgh

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/police-seek-to-ban-condoms-from-saunas-in-edinburgh-8898421.html
ADAM WITHNALL
Sex worker support charities say the move will just lead to increased rates of HIV

Police are trying to get condoms banned from Edinburgh’s licensed saunas, in a move which charities say will increase HIV rates and force the city’s prostitutes out onto the street.

A meeting of the Scottish capital’s licensing committee will decide today if a number of saunas – traditionally tolerated as a safe place for sex workers to conduct their business – will be forced to close.

Police Scotland has written to the city council arguing that the five saunas should only receive licences on the condition that there is a ban on all “items of a sexual nature” on the premises.

Charities which support sex workers in the city have attacked the police’s objections as “morality-driven”, and say it would put the lives of prostitutes and their clients at risk.

The group Scot-Pep (Scottish Prostitutes Education Project) quoted a recent report from the World Health Organisation (WHO) which said that governments “should take action to end the practice” of using condoms as evidence of sex work.

The WHO said: “Condoms should never be considered to be evidence of sex work, either in official laws or through unofficial law-enforcement practices, and condoms should never be confiscated from sex workers.”

Nadine Stott, a board member for Scot-Pep, told the BBC: “This goes against all basic common sense. It also places Scotland really out of step with the rest of the world.

“We are really shocked that, in private, the police have been quite clear to us. They said that the policy (on saunas) wasn't changing.

“We think this highlights how inappropriate the police are as a regulatory body of sex workers in a criminal context.”

Today’s decision comes after police raids in March which saw six premises, almost half of Edinburgh’s 13 saunas, have their licences put up for review.

Scot-Pep said those raids hailed a shift in attitudes which will see “Edinburgh follow Glasgow's lead, and drive women out onto the street rather than let us work in discretion and safely indoors”.

They quoted one sex-worker, named only as Cat, who said: “Condoms as evidence is really scary. They’re going to perpetrate these traumatic, horrible raids, and for what? To find condoms in my purse? All women should be afraid of these developments, but sex workers especially. What if they confiscate my condoms and I still have to work that night?”

Independent MSP Margo MacDonald told the Edinburgh Evening News: “I don’t know what their intention is but the effect of this would completely destroy the safer sex message that has been delivered to the sex industry and wider community over the last 30 years.

“With a line-up of expert and unimpeachable organisations opposed to this it makes the police look isolated and rather amateurish.”

A Police Scotland spokesman told the BBC: “Police Scotland recently provided reports to the Council Regulatory Committee in respect of a number of public entertainment licence renewals.

“In cases where there was evidence of criminality or premises operating out-with the conditions of their licence, objections were made to those licences being renewed.

“Police Scotland will continue to work with partners to inspect and report on licensed premises operating within Edinburgh in order to keep people safe.

“Whenever criminal activity, or licensing contraventions are detected within these venues, officers will respond appropriately and report all offences to the relevant authority.”

Breast Milk ‘Neutralises HIV and Holds Potential for Prevention Therapy’

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/515616/20131021/breast-milk-neutralises-hiv-prevention-therapy-protection.htm
 HANNAH OSBORNE

Protein in breast milk protects babies from getting HIV from infected mothers, says Duke Medicine research team

Breast milk has the ability to neutralise HIV and so protects babies from getting the infection from their mothers.

Researchers at Duke Medicine, North Carolina, have identified a protein in HIV that has the potential to lead to HIV prevention therapies.

The researchers found a protein in breast milk called Tenascin-C, or TNC), which has previously been identified as having healing properties, also has antimicrobial properties that kills infections such as HIV.

They say this property accounts for why not more nursing infants born to women with HIV also become infected.

Published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the researchers have identified how HNC in breast milk binds to and neutralises HIV, which appears to protect exposed infants who would otherwise have become infected from repeat exposure to the virus.

It is estimated that 330,000 children get HIV from their mothers during pregnancy, birth or breastfeeding every year. International health organisations are looking to eliminate mother-to-child transmission to babies through alternatives to antiretroviral therapy that are not affordable.

Researchers say the breast milk protein could be utilised to develop an oral prevention therapy similar to the rehydration salts routinely given to babies in developing parts of the world.

"Even though we have antiretroviral drugs that can work to prevent mother-to-child transmission, not every pregnant woman is being tested for HIV, and less than 60 percent are receiving the prevention drugs, particularly in countries with few resources," said senior author Sallie Permar.

Captures and neutralises virus

"So there is still a need for alternative strategies to prevent mother-to-child transmission, which is why this work is important."

The researchers took mature milk samples from uninfected women and looked for HIV-neutralisation activity. By separating proteins, they were able to identify the TNC protein.

Further analysis showed how TNC blocks the HIV virus engry by capturing virus particles and neutralising them.

 "TNC is a component of the extracellular matrix that is integral to how tissues hold themselves together," Permar said. "This is a protein involved during wound healing, playing a role in tissue repair. It is also known to be important in foetal development, but its reason for being a component of breast milk or its antiviral properties had never been described.

"It's likely that TNC is acting in concert with other anti-HIV factors in breast milk, and further research should explore this, but given TNC's broad-spectrum HIV-1-binding and neutralising activity, it could be developed as an HIV-prevention therapy, given orally to infants prior to breastfeeding, similar to the way oral rehydration salts are routinely administered to infants in developing regions."

She said that because TNC a naturally occurring component of breast milk, it is inherently safe and may also avoid the problem of HIV resistance to antiretroviral therapies.

Barton F Haynes, director of the Duke Human Vaccine Institute, said: "The discovery of the HIV inhibiting effect of this common protein in breast milk provides a potential explanation for why nursing infants born to HIV-infected mothers do not become infected more often than they do.

It also provides support for inducing inhibitory factors in breast milk that might be even more protective, such as antibodies, that would completely protect babies from HIV infection in this setting."

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