Porn Industry Gets Back to Work as Performer Thought to be HIV Positive Apparently Isn't

Star Foreman

Dearth Vader look-a-like at Exxxotica convention last month.

And it turns out it wasn't an HIV case at all. The adult video trade group Free Speech Coalition (FSC) announced over the weekend that a second test confirmed that a performer who initially tested positive for the virus that causes AIDS is actually HIV-negative.

As such, a one-week moratorium on smut production was lifted, and the porn can go on this week. Diane Duke, FSC executive director, via press statement:

The industry will be abundantly cautious as we try to nail down the reasons for what now appears to have been a false positive result on a previous test.

The AIDS Healthcare Foundation last week accused the industry of trying to cover up its latest HIV problem, saying it was dragging its feet on double-checking the original HIV test.

AHF has been trying to force condoms on an industry that says porn consumers won't buy smut that employs safe sex.

The industry says its once-a-month mandatory testing system works; it brings up cases like this latest false positive. AHF says testing can't prevent at outbreak, it can only tell you after the fact.

It appears that the latest HIV scare erupted up in Miami after a performer for the Mofos website got tested so he could be cleared for work and discovered the apparently false-positive.

While AHF president Michael Weinstein wondered aloud last week what fate would befall the 12 other performers who might have been exposed to the latest patient zero, a source told the Weekly over the weekend that performers who worked with the porn star were called in for testing within two days of his false positive.

It would appear at this point that the precaution was for naught. Or not.

[@dennisjromero/djromero@laweekly.com]