The lesser sites and a few naysayers actually accused me of making up the antibiotics story…well if you had sources like mine you would know better,
Hi Mike,
I hope you are doing well.
I wanted to share with you the two Petition 560 analyses conducted by the Division of Occupational Safety and Health (DOSH, or Cal/OSHA) and the Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board (OSHSB). As you are likely aware, Petition 560 is the FSC’s petition submitted to the OSHSB to amend the existing Bloodborne Pathogens standard (Title 8 Section 5193 of the California Code of Regulations).
The official OSHSB page for FSC’s Petition 560 is available here: http://www.dir.ca.gov/oshsb/petition-560.html
The two analyses have not yet been posted on that official OSHSB page for Petition 560, but the analyses are available to the public if an email request is submitted to the OSHSB. Therefore, the analyses are free to be published. I have attached the analyses as two separate PDFs.
You are correct that the FSC’s petition includes a recommendation for antibiotic pre-exposure prophylaxis. According to Petition 560, “Current medical studies are evaluating the efficacy of a doxycycline PrEP for bacterial STIs such as Gonorrhea, Chlamydia, Trichomoniasis and Syphilis. So far this research shows great promise and the petitioners recommend to include such advances in the standard.”
Unfortunately, Cal/OSHA cannot adopt the FSC’s recommendation for two simple reasons: (1) barrier protections (e.g., condoms) are the federal minimum standard, and (2) employers (e.g., producers) cannot reasonably oversee medication adherence among employees (e.g., performers).
Here are some noteworthy quotes from the DOSH analysis of Petition 560:
“Findings to date suggest that certain sexually transmitted infections—such as HIV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, gonorrhea, chlamydia, and trichomoniasis—are effectively prevented by correct condom use and less effectively prevented by the alternative methods identified by the petitioner.”
“Pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP, or Truvada)—adherence to the protocol for using PrEP ussually cannot be fully overseen by an employer, and partial adherence reduces protection proportionately. The manufacturer of Truvada further recommends that condoms continue to be used to maximize the effectiveness of the drug.”
“Treatment as Prevention (TasP)—adherence to the protocol for using TasP usually cannot be fully overseen by an employer. One study showed that the use of TasP only reduced HIV transmission by 26 percent.”
And here are some noteworthy quotes from the OSHSB analysis of Petition 560:
The Petitioner’s proposal for new Section 5193.1 requests that the Board make amendments to existing BBP protections that would render the California standard less protective than the federal equivalent standard.With latency periods for sexually transmitted infections, even the industry’s intense STD testing protocol is not as protective of employee health as observing universal precautions.
Here are the referenced PDF Files
Petition 560 DOSH evaluation (2016-07-08)
Petition 560 OSHSB evaluation (2016-07-14)
8 Responses
Ah so it comes out that the FSC was pushing the antibiotics so they could do an end run around condoms. Porn fans just do not like to see condoms in porn and condom porn clearly sells a lot less then non-condom porn. They were doing the antibiotics thing to try and boost porn sales.
How many times have I said it,,Cal Osha cannot adopt any standard that is less stringent than the Federal Osha standard. They never learn. ONLY IN PORN
@Karma
Yep FSC is advocating prophylactic antibiotics as a prophylactic to condoms.
Cal/OSHA analysis is much less friendly than the legislative analysis for prop 60.
Despite all their objections at the top of the petition FSC never specifies antibiotics, TasP, or PrEP in 27 pages of suggested language (changes to the enclosed proposed policy) Instead they add ‘Personal Protection Options’ with a testing protocol appendix specifying Aptima as the PCR-RNA.
Below is my favorite KINK through 27 pages of suggested language changes.
Application add ‘C’ exception for employers with no direction and control over the creation of a production.
I hate it to be repetitive, but until performers get that entitled finger off their ass and craft, agree and stick to a professional code of conduct, you can have all the calosha, matrioska, god and allah you want and nothing is ever going to change, in terms of health. In the meantime, no official words (but GO UNION!) have been heard from the international adult entertainment private business, on the matter. If they don’t send their voice out in such situations, I don’t know when.
Oh, by the way…am I wrong or Melissa Hill re-tweeted a #removePhylisha hashtag from her twitter account, earlier today? Damn, all the shit I’ve got from her the last few months…it looks like being unknown to some doesn’t necessarily mean to be wrong. I’d be tempted to promote a #removeMelissa2 hashatag, but I’m neither vengeful nor I am a bad person. If she finally figured out what the union situation is, I’m glad for her and I’m all in favor for her to get a second chance, if she can help changing things. Hopefully next time she will be at least more open minded when people criticize things she is involved with and she will avoid to dismiss them with the typical adult performer entitled finger stuck up her divine ass. No offense intended; just a figure of speech.
I think that Cal OSHA is making a big (huge, gargantuan sized) error here.
“are effectively prevented by correct condom use”.
Here’s the problem: Condoms break – and slip:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8070546
You are dealing with 2% or so breakage and almost 4% slippage (which leads to fluid leaks in both directions) under normal, cilivian, two pump chump usage levels. In porn, the usage generally would be more “industrial strength”, with penetration often being prolonged for filming, occurring in more stressful positions, and often including artificial lube and similar. While I can’t find a study, my guess (and only my guess) is that you would effectively double the breakage rates and more than that for slippage.
Further, and this is key: the real risk in using condoms in porn is that performers will become even MORE casual about their health, and performers who are knowingly ill may still perform. With a combined 10% or higher rate of breakage and slippage, that could end up being fatal for performers.
The real, true, and correct process should be two fold: Government mandated and monitored testing to assure that performers with ongoing infections are not performing, and the use of condoms during penetration scenes.
Now, there is still the questions of oral sex, ejeculation / cum shots, and the like. If I understand correct, things like Southern Bukkake would be illegal. I think that much of the fight is about aspects of porn that cannot ever match the standards being put forward. At some point, they may infringe on freedom of expression, and that’s a whole other “all the way to SCOTUS” legal argument.
You don’t have to use just ONE condom for the whole shoot. I’ve done plenty of condom shoots with no problem.
Hell, have had even more sex in life with condoms and never had an issue.
Lots of industries have Gov mandates, rules & safety regulations. Trying to think of an industry that doesn’t?
Sam, you have to remember that many (not all, not even the majority) people in porn basically flunked out of everything else in life and landed “here”. Enough of them wood be dumb enough to try to operate the whole time on a single condom (and save money too!)
Government mandates are find, provided that they (a) hit the intended target of making certain things safer, and more importantly (b) do not create situations which make everything else more dangerous.
Condoms, when used properly, are a good idea and increase safety. Nobody denies that (unless they are idiots). Condoms, when used improperly, provide a false sense of security that leads to problems.
My biggest fear is people getting sick and continuing to work, because they are “shooting safely with a condom”. Then the dom breaks, and boom, someone else gets sick.
You gotta admit, there enough dumb people in porn for that to happen…