THE DURANTY RECORD

In some ways, it’s almost obscene for us to get so upset about the lies and fabrications of one Jayson Blair when the lies and fabrications of the New York Times’ Walter Duranty covered up the massacre of millions. And Duranty got a Pulitzer the Times still holds! Arnold Beichman has the goods on Duranty’s appalling record.

THE ONION: Takes on partial birth abortion. I guess I shouldn’t find this funny.

HIV IN SAN FRANCISCO: You may recall the hysterical headlines of a couple of years ago about a surge in new HIV infections among gay men in San Francisco. Here’s a reminder of the rhetoric used from the San Francisco Chronicle:

San Francisco’s long-feared and often predicted new wave of HIV infection is here. After years of stability – wrought by strong prevention programs, a safer-sex ethic and powerful drugs – city health experts now estimate that the number of new infections by the virus that causes AIDS nearly doubled, to 900, in the past year. “This is a harbinger of what is going to happen all over the country,” warned Tom Coates, director of the University of California at San Francisco AIDS Research Institute. “What happens in the HIV epidemic usually happens here first.”

I was skeptical of the data and was pilloried by the usual suspects for being so. So was veteran AIDS activist Michael Petrelis. So it’s worth taking another look at what the stats now show. In April of this year, there wasn’t a single case of recent HIV infection found in city HIV testing sites, out of 843 tests. That was also true in February, March and June 2002. Total HIV infections seem completely stable from the data. There is, in fact, no evidence whatsoever of a surge in HIV infection rates among gay men in San Francisco. None. Rates of gonorrhea have actually fallen. Rectal gonorrhea, a key correlate of HIV infection, is also stable. The stories were bogus. But they haven’t been refuted.
(CORRECTION: In April of this year, there wasn’t a single case of recent HIV infection found in city HIV testing sites, out of 183 – not 843 – tests. 843 tests refers to the total number of tests from January to April. My bad. But the point holds.)