"A lot of gay men who are involved in this scene hook up online and search for others who want to have unprotected sex and take drugs," Ant, a 35-year-old man in Southeast London told The Independent. "Although I think there is awareness of HIV among the gay community, it’s still a taboo and there’s a real stigma surrounding it. A younger gay man in his 20s once told me that I didn’t look ill -- so how could I have HIV?"
Latest figures from Public Health England show that the rate of infection in the capital rose more than 20 per cent in 2012. Charities have warned that the virus is once again one of the most serious public health crises in the UK today.
Across the country, rates of infection were up by 8 per cent to 3,240 new infections among men who have sex with men. In London alone there were 1,720 new infections, with that figure likely to be revised up to nearly 2,000, figures published in The Lancet revealed.
Rates of transmission are likely to have been increased by irresponsible use of needles during drug-taking, but also because of a rise in people having unprotected sex while high on drugs.
