The Internet's Role as Modern Bathhouse Is Being Scrubbed: On-Line Hookups Increasingly Popular Among Men Who Have Sex With Men

New epidemiological data, combined with anecdotal evidence and research, show that men who have sex with men (MSM) are increasingly using Internet chat rooms to schedule "real time" sexual encounters. According to researchers and prevention counselors, the online venues for meeting sexual partners work nearly as fast as meeting at a bar or bathhouse.

HIV prevention organizations and researchers are already developing programs that target MSM looking for sex via the Internet, and some have found efficient ways to reach high-risk populations and provide interventions prior to MSM engaging in risky behavior.

In California, the trend of MSM meeting through the Internet has contributed to alarming increases in syphilis cases: The number of MSM with primary or secondary syphilis has increased from 162 reported cases in 2000 to 857 cases in 2002, said Terrence Lo, an epidemiologist with the California Department of Health Services in Berkeley. State data also show that 66 percent of the MSM whose syphilis was reported in 2002 were HIV-positive, and this percentage has also increased in recent years, according to Lo.

The Internet's role in this upturn is also apparent from the data. In the first half of 2001, 12 percent of the MSM with syphilis reported meeting their partners online; by the first half of 2003, this percentage increased to 40 percent, Lo pointed out. "What we're finding is that people who meet partners off the Internet have a higher number of sex partners than those who said they didn't, and they have a higher number of nonlocatable partners, which is problematic for us," said Lo. "We can't find them for testing and counseling."

In response, a number of community-based organizations and other groups have begun prevention projects that focus on Internet sex seekers by using the same technology in outreach. "By providing anonymity, the Internet allows counselors to discuss issues some men might be reluctant to discuss in other settings," said Dr. Gregory Rebchook, investigator for the Center for AIDS Prevention Studies at University of California-San Francisco.

PowerOn in Seattle and SexEd4U in Ferndale, Mich., are two programs that reach MSM in chatrooms at the precise moments when they may be making a decision to have anonymous sex. Another new intervention is the Internet Sexuality Information Services Inc., which provides syphilis elimination services to MSM in San Francisco. ISIS also collaborates with the California Department of Health to coordinate an on-line Syphilis Action Coalition in the Bay Area.

Back to other news for September 30, 2003