You've Got Mail... And Maybe an STD, Too

Dec. 16, 2005 — -- The same generation that's using the Internet to find dates is also using the Web to tell their partners they may have taken away something more than a nice memory from their romantic encounter.

The Los Angeles County Health Department has established a Web site, www.inSpotLA.org/, targeted mostly toward gay men, which allows users to inform their sexual partners that they may have been exposed to disease.

Featured on the site is a selection of electronic greeting cards with a variety of chatty greetings to choose from:"There's something I need to tell you."

"It's not what you brought to the party, it's what you left with."

And there's the payoff line: "I got an STD, and you might have it too."

LA County's Director of Public Health, Dr. Jonathan Fielding, said, "It does not give people a diagnosis. All it does is tell somebody that they may have been exposed and they should get tested."

The Los Angeles County Health Department established the Web site in its continuing fight against sexually transmitted diseases, especially AIDS.

Health officials estimate that in L.A. County alone, up to 60,000 people have HIV and a quarter of them don't know it.

The Web site has more than just the electronic notification cards. It has information about diseases, treatment, and where to go to get help.

"We just want to have as many different ways for people to get critical information to those at risk as soon as possible," Fielding said. "That's the best way of controlling these terrible epidemics of sexually transmitted diseases."

The Internet is becoming an increasingly common place to find everything from dates to one-night stands, and the only thing partners often know about each other is an e-mail address. So, health officials are trying to establish their own presence online.

Fielding said, "There's no question that this is in essence ... at least to the gay population ... the new bathhouses."

The Web site gives users the ability to tailor messages and specify exactly what disease might be involved: syphilis, gonorrhea, or even HIV. Users can include a personal message or send the card anonymously.

Some critics have questioned whether this is the best way to tell someone they might have been exposed, particularly to HIV. But, "The best thing is for people to disclose," said Karen Mall of the AIDS Healthcare Foundation. "That's the message."

The Los Angeles Web site is modeled after one in San Francisco, which has sent out as many as 500 e-cards a month.

Similar Web sites are also planned for Seattle and Philadelphia.

It's a way for the reluctant to give the bad news. Ramon Ramirez, a testing counselor at the AIDS Healthcare Foundation explained that "some of them say , 'Mm, I'm not sure. How can I do it? How can I tell them?'"

Ramirez said this is just one way to say, "You've got mail ... and you might have something else, too."