After an outcry by gay activists and a pointed editorial in the Bay Area Reporter, a queer weekly newspaper, UCSF apologized for a recent press release about a new study claiming that gay men were disproportionately more likely to contract a new strain of drug-resistant staphylococcus through anal sex. But while UCSF officials have backpedaled, the San Francisco Chronicle has not.
Last month the Chronicle published a front-page story by medical writer Sabin Russell ("S.F. gay community an epicenter for new strain of virulent staph") about the UCSF-led staph study that some Castro residents say caused widespread alarm and unnecessarily stigmatized gay men. Critics say the Chronicle story sensationalized the report on drug-resistant staph infections by describing a single case in New York in which a "flesh-eating bacteria" had damaged a patient's groin tissue. Researcher and lead report author Binh An Diep was quoted describing the Castro as the epicenter of a "national problem," and that the staph infection will peak when it "spreads into the general population."
Staph Infection Coverage Generates Gay Health Hysteria
SF Weekly, CA
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