The Swingers Board - View Single Post - Would you go to a club that required STD Testing

highlander · 08-07-2008, 01:27 AM

I ran questions on this topic by a few folks:
1) a former member of the statistical advisory board for CDC

2) a senior epidemiologist at CDC

3) Michael Kowalski, the medical adviser to a company that is promoting sharing of STD test results securely via the internet. Those folks have a bunch of papers on the rationale behind expanding testing in "social network" populations.

The first feedback that I got was from 1) above. I asked him specifically whether a population in which people were tested, shared test results and limited contact to partners with a similar STD testing profile would have a lower incidence of STD's than a similar population with similar sexual habits and condom using habits. He thought that regular testing would be associated with a significant difference-but he wasn't aware of a good study that showed just how great the difference would be. He thought any benefits would be highly variable from population to population.

Someone I talked to said there is a technology in the works that overcomes many of the objections folks here have had to expanded use of STD testing. That technology uses DNA chips to conduct the tests. That approach is a major research project-and is the type of thing that will require some big companies to get behind it. This guy knows one of the major researchers who says they have working prototypes-but the Bush administration stalled testing. If they get some better cooperation they are 5-10 years from having an FDA approved product they can market. DNA chips lower the cost of testing enormously-you can simply take a finger prick blood sample and test for the presence of the types of DNA associated with STD causing organisms. In large scale production DNA chips should be very inexpensive-which means you might have a bank of tests as sensitive as what AIM Foundation has been doing for the porn actor community, but something that would have a 15-30 minute test turn around and would sell for $2-5/test panel. What they are hoping to promote is the idea people would routinely test every time they consider a new partner-or frequently test regular partners.

08-07-2008, 01:27 AM	#36 (permalink)
highlander Swingers Board Addict Join Date: Aug 2002 Posts: 217 Location: Portland,OR	Re: Would you go to a club that required STD Testing I ran questions on this topic by a few folks: 1) a former member of the statistical advisory board for CDC 2) a senior epidemiologist at CDC 3) Michael Kowalski, the medical adviser to a company that is promoting sharing of STD test results securely via the internet. Those folks have a bunch of papers on the rationale behind expanding testing in "social network" populations. The first feedback that I got was from 1) above. I asked him specifically whether a population in which people were tested, shared test results and limited contact to partners with a similar STD testing profile would have a lower incidence of STD's than a similar population with similar sexual habits and condom using habits. He thought that regular testing would be associated with a significant difference-but he wasn't aware of a good study that showed just how great the difference would be. He thought any benefits would be highly variable from population to population. Someone I talked to said there is a technology in the works that overcomes many of the objections folks here have had to expanded use of STD testing. That technology uses DNA chips to conduct the tests. That approach is a major research project-and is the type of thing that will require some big companies to get behind it. This guy knows one of the major researchers who says they have working prototypes-but the Bush administration stalled testing. If they get some better cooperation they are 5-10 years from having an FDA approved product they can market. DNA chips lower the cost of testing enormously-you can simply take a finger prick blood sample and test for the presence of the types of DNA associated with STD causing organisms. In large scale production DNA chips should be very inexpensive-which means you might have a bank of tests as sensitive as what AIM Foundation has been doing for the porn actor community, but something that would have a 15-30 minute test turn around and would sell for $2-5/test panel. What they are hoping to promote is the idea people would routinely test every time they consider a new partner-or frequently test regular partners.
	Last edited by highlander; 08-07-2008 at 03:27 AM.