Posted on 07/16/2006 6:55:39 PM PDT by DBeers
CLEVELAND - City health officials want the owner of a new, upscale gay bathhouse to provide condoms, offer customers regular HIV testing and appoint employees to answer questions about preventing sexually transmitted diseases.
The Flex club, which is scheduled to open next month, will become part of a chain of six bathhouses extending from Atlanta to Los Angeles. Plans for the 50,000-square-foot complex inside a defunct Greyhound bus depot feature three pools, two saunas and a gym and include 110 cabana-like spa rooms equipped with cots and televisions, 18 hotel rooms and a restaurant.
City leaders say the club could help spark the economic revival of a desolate commercial block, but they also worry that the bathhouse could fuel a growth of HIV/AIDS and other diseases.
"I think it's going to be a big mess in the not-too-distant future," said William Tiedemann, AIDS director for the Cleveland Department of Public Health.
Last year, an 11-year-high 118 new HIV diagnoses were reported among Cleveland residents, according statistics gathered by the city health department. As of Dec. 31, 2,458 Cleveland residents had been reported as living with HIV or AIDS, a rate of about 514 per 100,000 residents, and about four times the state rate.
Two of every three Ohio cases of HIV/AIDS occur in men, and homosexual sex is believed to be the source of many infections.
Charles Fleck, founder and owner of the Flex club, said he's concerned about health and safety at the club. He said he wants to work with the health department to ensure that customers are protected.
"Look, I'm a gay man," he said. "I went through the entire AIDS saga, and I am still going through it."
City leaders want to review Fleck's policy of evicting members caught using drugs or soliciting sex. They also want Fleck to sign an agreement outlining other guidelines.
City Councilman Joe Cimperman, who learned about the project 18 months ago when an architect contacted the city zoning board, said he has few concerns. Cimperman said he asked about public health measures and was told that condoms and prevention messages would circulate throughout the club.
Public health officials and AIDS activists in Cleveland said they aren't opposed to bathhouses. Research has shown they are a valuable and convenient venue for promoting safer sex practices, and AIDS organizations acknowledge that the clubs are safer for gay men than cruising other areas, such as parks.
Flex will compete with a smaller gay bathhouse, Club Cleveland, located in the same area. Club Cleveland has always provided HIV testing and free condoms, said owner Ray Wolf.
When Flex opens, it will become the fifth bathhouse in Ohio. The Flex and Club chains both have branches in Columbus. A bathhouse in Toledo is independently operated.
Flex's other location are in New Orleans and Phoenix.
How long would McDonald's last if it sold burgers that gave a disease to customers at "a rate of about 514 per 100,000", or a roller rink where 514 customers per 100,000 were injured for life?
Yet, a bathhouse that will be the prime venue for the transmission of a deadly disease is pretty much given a pass.
Homosexuals don't have bathrooms at home? Or do they get dirty so frequently they need extra baths throughout the day?
I'm going to pick a nit here and ask "Who's we Kimosabe?"
I don't contribute one iota to this problem. I've been saying for years if we really want to stop it, we need to quarantine those who are infected and refuse to cease the behavior that spreads a 100% lethal disease.
I seriously doubt that you 'contribute' to the problem either my friend.
If people knew that if they caught this disease and continued with their stupid, risky, selfish behavior that they would lose their freedom they most likely wouldn't engage in it and the 'epidemic' would burn itself out.
Then we would be back to the good old days when all one had to worry about was a nasty case of the Clap.
L
Oh just catch some of my comments on other threads. You're opinion will come back down to earth. ;-)
Read a few of my posts and I'm sure your opinion of my grasp of common sense will come down a peg or two...or three...or four.
L
Yeah, but with all the queers coming in, did you have to mention "rubber" and "jello" in the same sentence?
No I don't and I'm sure you don't, but I do think it's reasoned to admit that some heterosexuals do spread some pretty rank diseases, up to and including AIDS. Is it to the degree that homosexuals do? No, there just isn't as much trauma involved in the acts in most instances.
I've never recommended quaranteening people, but I have had a very sympathetic view if it involved promiscuous people who were hell bent on infecting others, especially if that person hadn't a clue.
If monogomous homosexuals want to continue to have relations when both parties know what the risks are, I'm less inclined to quaranteen them.
I too think this disease would have basicly destroyed it's hosts and therefore itself if proper public health policies had been put in place and adhered to.
It's really a shame that they weren't.
Thanks for the comments.
No kidding.
You're quite welcome and I thank you for yours.
You take care now. Things are getting pretty squirrelly of late.
L
Yes they are. You take care as well.
The new clientele was there when you went there way back in the sixties. They were hanging around the toilets watching you pee. Maybe you just didnt notice them ,Fruits always hang around bus stations looking for a young kid to pervert.
...and to make sure employees "sign an agreement outlining other guidelines" -- don't forget that!
I shudder to think what those 'guidelines' might be.
L
City leaders say the club could help spark the economic revival of a desolate commercial block, but they also worry that the bathhouse could fuel a growth of HIV/AIDS and other diseases.
Pay me now or pay me later thinking? Maybe this is short term versus long term thinking?
In my opinion -this is just stupid thinking -to think that homosexual sex will positively contribute in any way to society is bizarre...
The city leaders are really just wondering whether the possible short-term pay off will justify the assured long-term damage that will follow pimping homosexual sex in their city...
Isn't maintaining a house of prostitution illegal in Ohio?
Back in the early 90's the government was footing the bill for one of my patient's HIV med's to the tune of about $21,000 dollars a year.
Perhaps, the economic revival will be in the form of all the money from the government to pay for medical treatment for the guys who acquire HIV/AIDs at the bath house.
I shutter to think about those poor folk hired to do janitorial and maintenance work at that place. I'll bet the turn over in those jobs is really, really high.
On the bright side though, I think when law breakers get sentenced to X number of hours doing Community Service, emptying trash cans and changing sheets/towels in this place might just fit the bill. It's one thing to do Community Service picking up litter on the highway, quite another to clean "private cabanas" in a gay bath house.
That's just plain mean.
Perhaps that's why I like it so very much. L
2 words "private club". In some parts of the south where they have dry counties that is how they get around liquor laws. A 'massage parlor' is a place of business where the only business is sex and people get paid for it, i.e prostitution. At the bath house you pay to be a member like a gym and then what you do behind closed doors is given a nice wink and a nod because, afterall we all have to be tolerant and accepting you know.
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