Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Study: Adults Still Don't Know How to Wash Their Hands After Going Potty. Gross.

As big proponents of hand-washing, we're a little grossed out to leave the house today after reading that only 5 percent of people who wash their hands after using the toilet actually do it properly enough to keep the nastiness at bay. Michigan State University researchers observed 3,749 people in ... More >>

San Francisco Is Slim and Trim, Ranks Fourth Fittest City in America

All that hill-climbing you had to do to get from the taco truck to the bar has paid off -- San Francisco was ranked the fourth fittest city in America by the American College of Sport Medicine's American Fitness Index. This sixth annual report tallies up the overall health and community fitness sta ... More >>

Afflicted: STD Rates Are Rising, but No One Knows Why

Ridiculous Websites Claim S.F. Doesn't Lead the Country in Brewing or General Booziness

So we do understand that, statistically speaking, San Francisco can't be the best at everything food- and drink-wise (even though it totally is), and also that complaining about silly Internet lists is like complaining about philandering politicians or high gas prices -- these things will happen no ... More >>

S.F. Man Infected With West Nile Virus

Health officials have confirmed that a San Francisco man tested positive for the West Nile Virus, the first human case since 2005. What's more, the man has not traveled outside the Bay Area, which almost certainly means he contracted the disease right here. The good news is that the man is recoverin ... More >>

West Nile Virus Makes Its Way to San Francisco

September is one of the few months when San Franciscans can actually enjoy warm weather. Unfortunately, we can't really relax and enjoy it: Those freeloading mosquitoes are sucking away that one small pleasure. Health officials are warning residents to watch out for mosquitoes after they found a de ... More >>

Bacterial Vaginosis Leads to Higher Transmission of HIV

A new study published last month reported findings that show a link between bacterial vaginosis and higher HIV transmission rates. Specifically, women are at a greater risk of contracting HIV and become three times more likely to pass it on to male partners if they have bacterial vaginosis, which is ... More >>

Your Kids Should Probably Be More Afraid of Dog Bites Than Gay People

Earlier today, we told you about Save California, that right-wing and totally off-base group in Sacramento that's spending a ton of time and money pleading with parents to keep their kids locked inside on Harvey Milk Day -- May 22.But you know what your children should probably be more afraid of tha ... More >>

"Falls Prevention Awareness Day" Falls on First Day of Fall

Be aware!​"Did you or your readers know," queried the press release,"that more than 1/3 of those age 65 and older fall every year? And that once someone has fallen, they are two to three times more likely to fall again?"Well? Did you? We did not. We also did not predict that this was the windup f ... More >>

"Contagion": Steven Soderbergh's Frighteningly Smart Pandemic Thriller

SF Weekly Letters

Got a Venereal Disease? You Can't Work in S.F. Restaurants

The S.F. Health code was probably written in the same era as this 1933 pamphlet​SF Weekly writers do not, in fact, peruse the San Francisco Health Code in our spare time, but in working on another blog post last week, we came across this gem in Article 8 (Food and Food Products): Sec. 453: Di ... More >>

Asians Attack City for Lack of HIV Prevention Programs

Yo, where's the Asian Healthy Penis? ​The San Francisco Department of Public Health is known for being particularly hip and inventive with its STD-prevention campaigns targeting gay men. Based on the progressive campaigning the DPH has conducted in the past, including the Healthy Penis campaign (h ... More >>

S.F. Dating: Violence Higher for LGBT Teens

It needs to get better​A new survey of San Francisco Unified School District teens says gay middle school boys were more than four times as likely to report being assaulted by their intimate partners than straight boys were. Gay middle school girls, meanwhile, were three times as likely as straigh ... More >>

Avoiding Auto Versus Pedestrian Crashes Could Save Taxpayers Cash

You Can't Cry Your Way Out of a Speeding Ticket Anymore

You've got it all wrong, officer.​Cops hate to cite speeding drivers almost as much as speeding drivers hate getting tickets. Police are sick and tired of the whining and crying and worse -- the verbal abuse they get when pulling drivers over. Perhaps that might influence them to look the other wa ... More >>

How Safe Is Chicken Tartare? A Saga of Discovery

CAKES A./FlickrChicken tartare at Ippuku: Just looking at this photo makes me crave it again.​In the week following simultaneous restaurant reviews in the Chronicle and SF Weekly of Ippuku, a Japanese restaurant in Berkeley, the Chronicle's comments sections filled with disgust over a dish that bo ... More >>

SF Weekly Letters

San Francisco 'America's Leanest City' According to Men's Health

Men's Health says San Fran is toothpicky.​And it's not is not necessarily a compliment.But let's start with the facts. Men's Health magazine looked at some stats in American cities, including the percentage of people overweight; the percentage of people with type 2 diabetes; and the percentage of ... More >>

S.F clinics limiting STD tests to cut costs

Got Swine Flu? Call a Doctor. Then Call a Politician.

​Those of a certain age may remember the wonderful Chris Guest-Billy Crystal sketches from Saturday Night Live in which Willie and Frankie, a pair of none-too-bright New York City characters who enjoyed nothing more than comparing notes of the twisted, masochistic self-mutilation they needlessly e ... More >>

Further Proof That Incarceration Is No Fun: Inmates File Federal Suit Over Alleged Price Gouging In Prison Cantina

But no one loves pricey coffee​As hard-liners say, "you do the crime, you do the time." But if you feel you're getting ripped off by paying too much for prison coffee -- to quote Doug Llewelyn, "You take 'em to court." Eight inmates at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City in the far north of ... More >>

SF Gov InAction: Pot Farming Illegal Immigrants Threaten to Bring DJs to City Hall Meetings!

  Monday, Oct. 5   10 a.m. - Public Safety Committee   On the whole, people are in favor of "Public Safety," so most of the time the Public Safety Committee is pretty uncontroversial. The chairman arches his eyebrows and asks the Mayor's Office of Criminal Justice "Why aren' ... More >>

Sex Positive

Swine Flu, Shwine Flu: Curiously Written Missive From Mexican Tourism Board Urges Visitors to Come Anyway

Public Enemy No. 1...Employing language worthy of a fast-talking abogado, a release fired off Wednesday by the Mexican Tourism Board and Ministry of Tourism and sent to members of the American media by Mexican consulates notes that "No tourists currently in Mexico have been infected by the H1N1 Infl ... More >>

Giant, Anthropomorphic Penises All the Rage in San Francisco These Days

San Francisco Department of Public HealthThe Penismobile is a hybrid? We were sure it'd be a Jaguar XKEYou don't always say this about penises, but in San Francisco, they come in threes. First there was the walking, advice-dispensing dong featured in a locally produced health film/soap opera.Then th ... More >>

Walking Penis Highlights Local Doc's Wildly Effective STD Prevention Soap Opera

Coming soon to an STD clinic near you! The San Francisco Department of Public Health is proud to announce that Safe in the City -- a dramatic 23-minute STD prevention video developed by an SFDPH official -- has given the Centers for Disease Control a giant boner. This week, ... More >>

Are Firefighters Being Poisoned By Their Pants (Held Up With Red Suspenders)?

The joke referenced in the headline is most definitely not funny. But you know what's even less funny? Heavy metal poisoning. Firefighters in Boca Raton have persuaded the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to launch an investigation to determine whether flame-retardant pants are a contribut ... More >>

Clap On! See Where San Francisco Stands in National STD Survey

When in a city beginning with the letter "M," pack your own condoms -- or elseThe results of the Centers for Disease Control's annual survey on whether we've been naughty or nice are in again -- and there's a whole lotta shaking (and itching, burning, and blistering) going on. Educated folks can arg ... More >>

Get Your Teenage Soccer Slut HPV-Proofed

Keep Those Nasty Bits Squeaky Clean: USA300 Wants You!

Party Foul: Five Million Party Pizzas Recalled Over E. Coli

Party Foul: Five Million Party Pizzas Recalled Over E. Coli

A Question of Risk

Plans for a biodefense "hot lab" at Lawrence Livermore have ecologists, disarmament advocates, and mainstream scientists up in arms

Vicious Cycle

Federal investigators clear AIDS prevention programs of wrongdoing -- and then reinvestigate them

You Make Me Sick

Pleasant reprimands for cubicle coughers and train-platform trashers

Staying Alive

An AIDS vaccine should be our government's highest priority. So why is one researcher forced to seek funding from the War on Terrorism?

Dog Bites

What Did You Sing in the War, Daddy?; Anthrax for Dummies

South to the Future

FAT OF THE LAND: First in a Four-Part Series

Letters

Lab Rats

UCSF's Stanley Prusiner is a Nobel laureate and superstar of medical research. But employees don't feel safe working for him.

Private Places

Gay activists push for return of traditional bathhouses

Letters

Viral Combat

Chiron Corp. and the nasty fight over the billion-dollar rights to the hepatitis C test

Night+Day

The Living Daylights

Some people with HIV don't get sick for years and years and years. Their lives might contain the clues for the cure.

Drug Story (Part I)

Discovered by brain researchers in the early '60s and resurrected by bodybuilders in the late '80s, the semi-illicit compound GHB is now marketed on the club and smart-drug circuits as a sexy wonder drug. But beware GHB's knockout punch.

Drug Story (Part II)

Discovered by brain researchers in the early '60s and resurrected by bodybuilders in the late '80s, the semi-illict compound GHB is now marketed on the club and smart-drug circuits as a sexy wonder drug. But beware GHB's knockout punch.

The Straight Poop

Human excrement in the parks -- dangerous or just dirty?

Getting Hep

Hepatitis B is the Rodney Dangerfield of diseases: It just can't get respect. But it sure can kill you.