San Francisco Chronicle - Tuesday, August 16, 2005
Rachel Gordon, Chronicle Staff Writer

"Crystal meth use is the newest and most important threat to the HIV epidemic in the United States," Dr. James Dilley, director of the UC San Francisco AIDS Health Project, said in a prepared statement released Monday.

The study was conducted jointly by researchers for the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, UC San Francisco and the San Francisco Department of Public Health.

The study's findings underscore the red flag health officials have been raising about crystal meth: People who use it drop their inhibitions and are more likely to engage in risky behaviors, such as unprotected sex with multiple partners, that increase the chance of HIV infection.

First reported in the August issue of the medical journal AIDS, the study looked at 3,000 San Franciscans who received anonymous HIV tests in 2000 and 2001.

Of the 300 people in the study who voluntarily reported they used crystal meth, 6 percent had recently been infected with HIV. The infection rate was close to 8 percent for those who admitted to using crystal meth during sexual encounters.

Among respondents who said they had not used meth, 2 percent had recently contracted HIV.

"It is a complicated problem requiring a carefully planned response," Dilley said. "Having doctors, public health officials, policymakers and, most importantly, community members working together is the only means of success."

To that end, said Dr. Jeffrey Klausner, San Francisco's director of Sexually Transmitted Disease Control and senior author of the study, it is essential to combine drug-treatment and drug-prevention programs with efforts to curtail HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases, such as syphilis.

"It is important to address crystal use to control those epidemics," Klausner said.

A federal study in five U.S. cities early this year found that new HIV infections among gay and bisexual men in San Francisco were occurring at about half the rate recorded four years ago.

Among a sample of 365 gay men contacted here in bars and dance clubs, sex clubs and gyms, on the streets and in parks and shops, the study found they were becoming infected at a rate of 1.2 percent per year. San Francisco epidemiologists had previously estimated an infection rate of 2.2 percent.

E-mail Rachel Gordon at rgordon@sfchronicle.com.
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