|
Could “Bug Chasing” Be More Serious Than
We Want to Admit?
When I saw the headline on the cover of the
February 6 issue of Rolling Stone, I cringed. My dismay was partly the cause
of a sinking feeling that the story would be filled with sensationalism and
over-reaction—a fear that was quickly realized.
Right beside Shania Twain’s glittered
midriff was a boxed promo touting an investigative story on “Bug Chasers:
The Men Who Long to be HIV+.” It was the equivalent of a journalistic
exclamation point, and though the headline was boxed in blue, yellow would
have been a more appropriate color.
But there was something else that was making
me uncomfortable—the possibility that there is more to the bug-chasing
story than any of us in the gay community wants to admit.
There have been anecdotal stories of “bug
chasers”—men who purposely seek HIV-infection—and “gift
givers”—HIV-positive men who seek to infect negative partners—since
the early 1990s. I remember looking into the story myself at one point. It
never materialized for two reasons: It was difficult to document if the
phenomenon really existed, even among a tiny handful of men. But equally
important, at the time, I simply couldn’t get editors in the gay media
interested in the story.
So part of the pangs I felt at the Rolling
Stone headline was guilt: Is it possible that we in the gay and lesbian
media missed this story because we simply didn’t want to see it?
I know from personal experience that we as a
community are often blind to what we wish wasn’t there. In 1995, I wrote a
feature for a paper in Philadelphia, where I was living at the time, about
the return of back rooms to gay bars. When the story hit the stands, I was
persona non grata in the gay community. Some gay bars banned me. At the
places where I was allowed in, patrons threatened me with physical violence.
And gay community leaders organized a panel allegedly to discuss the impact
of the article; the event turned out to be little more than a public
lynching.
My unforgivable crime, I learned, was telling
one of our community’s secrets to the outside world.
Are we doing the same with the question of
bug chasing?
Unfortunately, the Rolling Stone article was
so poorly written and melodramatically presented that it won’t help us get
any closer to thoughtfully examining the question of bug chasing. Sadly,
Rolling Stone blew its chance to ask a provocative social question by
choosing sensationalism over seriousness. But our response to it shouldn’t
be equally blind.
Even before the article hit the stands, gay
and AIDS activists have been picking it apart—quite easily.
The article’s major downfall appears to be
its unbelievable claim that 25 percent of new HIV infections among gay men
are caused deliberately by bug chasing. That is an astounding
statistic—and one that just doesn’t live up to scrutiny.
In the article, the sole basis for this
figure is attributed to an estimate by Dr. Bob Cabaj, director of
behavioral-health services for San Francisco County, and past president of
two leading gay medical groups: the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association, and
the Association of Gay and Lesbian Psychiatrists.
In trumpeting the 25 percent figure no
research was cited, no hard figures were offered, no data was presented.
Just one man’s off-the-cuff personal estimate.
Here’s where it gets worse: Dr. Cabaj says
he never gave that estimate. He told Newsweek that the assertion was
“totally false. I never said that. And when the fact-checker called me and
asked me if I said that, I said no. This is unbelievable.”
The only other medical source in the story
also refutes comments attributed to him in the article. Rolling Stone quotes
Dr. Marshall Forstein, at Fenway Community Center in Boston, as saying that
“ bug chasers are seen regularly in the Fenway health system, and the
phenomenon is growing.” Dr. Forstein now calls that quote “entirely a
fabrication.” Instead, he says that Fenway has seen a few such cases, but
that it’s impossible to know how common the practice is.
The writer shoots himself in the foot when he
takes that 25 percent figure and tries to come up with a number for just how
many gay men were infected through bug-chasing. He carelessly applies the
25-percent to the total estimated 40,000 new HIV infections every year,
proposing that 10,000 gay men each year are infected through deliberate bug
chasing. But gay men make up only 42 percent of total new infections—or
about 16,800 men. Rolling Stone’s figure of 10,000 gay men infected
through bug chasing would mean that a whopping 60 percent of new infections
in gay men are through bug chasing.
I touched base with several AIDS experts, and
all of them felt that if bug-chasing was responsible for a significant rate
of infections, the medical community would be aware of it—and hopefully be
trying to counteract it. Due to the current atmosphere created by the
Rolling Stone article, the experts I spoke with asked not to be quoted.
But I was struck that no one I spoke to
denied that bug chasing was a reality. The consensus seems to be that it
happens, but probably in very small numbers.
Before sitting down to write this, I got on
AOL, a popular meeting place for gay men, and did a random, unscientific
search for “bug chasers” and “gift givers.” It didn’t take but a
few seconds to come up with about 40 profiles that mention one or the other.
I found only three profiles where men were seeking such behavior. In all the
others, the profiles specifically warned “bug chasers” to stay away.
Still, if men are putting those terms in their profiles, even to ward off
hunters, it suggests that the practice is out there and real.
I understand why the gay and AIDS communities
have come out in such full force to counter the flawed and inaccurate
Rolling Stone article. By choosing sensationalism, Rolling Stone forfeited
its chance to take a cold, hard look at bug chasing and what it means for
gay men.
We
shouldn’t fall into a similar trap. In our fury over the article, it
isn’t enough to just give Rolling Stone a slap on the wrist, and then
continue to look the other way because the topic of bug chasing makes most
of us feel awkward. I hope we don’t miss this chance to take a serious
look at the uncomfortable issue of bug chasing, evaluate its impact, and
figure out what we might be able to do as a community to counter it.
Mubarak Dahir
receives e-mail at MubarakDah@aol.com.
|
Back to Top of Page 
