Religious Leaders Demand Meeting Of African Gay Lobby Ahead Of AIDS Conference In Ethiopia Be Cancelled Saying Group “Dirties Our Culture,” Less Than 30-Percent Of Americans Living With HIV Receive Optimal Care, Illinois Allows Gay Couples In Civil Unions To File State Joint Taxes, Daniel Radcliffe To Play Allen Ginsburg In Gay-Themed Thriller, Lady Gaga On Marriage And Relationships

A meeting organized by an African gay lobby group ahead of an AIDS conference in Ethiopia has sparked a rare fight between the government and religious groups. Reuters Africa reports that religious leaders demand the cancellation of the gathering scheduled for Saturday, organized by African Men for Sexual Health and Rights, saying it would violate the country's conservative culture. State officials, however, are unwilling to budge having lobbied hard to win hosting rights for the influential 16th International Conference on AIDS and STIs in Africa due to start a day later. On Tuesday, Abune Paulos, patriarch of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, joined the Muslim mufti and the heads of the Catholic and Protestant churches for a meeting before delivering scathing remarks about homosexuals to the media. Young church activists handed out dossiers railing against the weekend meeting on "men who have sex with men (MSM) in Africa and HIV", which is scheduled to feature presentations from 15 experts. "We were prompted to sound this alarm after this group launched immoral activities that would tarnish and dirty our culture," read part of the dossier. Health Minister Tedros Adhanom met the religious leaders but made no denunciation of the gay group's gathering. Abune Paulos afterwards told reporters, "We will continue to pray." Homosexuality is taboo in many African nations. It is illegal in 37 countries on the continent, including Ethiopia, and activists say few Africans are openly gay, fearing imprisonment, violence and loss of jobs.

Only slightly more than one-quarter of Americans infected with the AIDS virus are getting the form of medical care that maximizes their life expectancy, according to a new estimate. The Washington Post reports that the goal of AIDS treatment is to suppress growth of HIV until the virus is no longer detectable in the bloodstream. Only 28-percent of the 1.2 million people living with HIV in the United States have their “viral load” controlled to that optimal degree, epidemiologists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Tuesday. “We have substantial work ahead to fully realize the benefit of treatment in the United States,” Thomas R. Frieden, CDC’s director, said in a press briefing two days before World AIDS Day, which is Thursday. “It is time to act even more aggressively,” said Jonathan Mermin, the agency’s director of HIV/AIDS prevention. The estimate encompasses the experience of the entire HIV-positive population, including people who don’t know they are infected and those who can’t get or don’t want medical care. For people enrolled in treatment, the fraction with a fully suppressed viral load is much higher and more encouraging — about 77-percent. The CDC is emphasizing the low overall percentage of people who have achieved the goal of full viral suppression as a way to emphasize how much remains to be done 30 years into the AIDS epidemic. The agency in recent years has endorsed universal HIV testing of Americans, and urged physicians and health departments to make sure that people found to be infected get treatment. About 80-percent of Americans with HIV know they are infected. About 20-percent are unaware — a situation that, studies have shown, makes it much more likely they will transmit the virus to others. Slightly more than 75-percent of people are “linked to care” within four months of receiving their diagnosis, but only 50-percent stay in care. The CDC analysis did not address why so many people with HIV infection stop treatment. However, many diseases have high rates of attrition from treatment, with reluctance to take pills, drug side effects, inconvenience, expense and denial all being reasons. Of people remaining in care, 89-percent were prescribed antiretroviral therapy, which consists of three or more drugs that prevent the virus from replicating. Of that group, 77-percent had a fully suppressed viral load the last time they were tested.

Illinois couples who have entered into civil unions will be able to jointly file their 2011 state tax returns, according to a state Revenue Department spokeswoman and Equality Illinois, a state-wide gay rights group. Since Illinois' civil union law went into effect in June, the tax status of couples in a civil union has been unclear. But The Chicago Tribune reports that in a news release late Monday, Equality Illinois said it had worked with the Department of Revenue and confirmed that same sex couples and others in civil unions will be able to file joint state tax returns just as married spouses do. Department of Revenue spokeswoman Susan Hofer confirmed that as requested by Governor Pat Quinn, the state has made arrangements to allow couples in civil unions to file jointly. Couples in civil unions still have no joint-filing tax status on the federal level. According to Equality Illinois, the new guidelines issued by the Department of Revenue say same sex couples in a civil union may elect to file state taxes as "married, filed jointly" or "married, filed separately." In a statement, Equality Illinois CEO Bernard Cherkasov said, "In order to ensure that couples in a civil union were afforded the same rights as other spouses, we needed the leadership of Gov. Quinn and Revenue Director Brian Hamer, and we thank them for standing up for equality. We are grateful to them and their respective staffs for their commitment to equal treatment for same-sex couples."

Just last week Harry Potter and The Woman In Black star Daniel Radcliffe was quoted in the French press saying that he would very likely be playing a gay character in a film to release in 2012. And it would appear that gay character is no less than Beat poet Allen Ginsberg. Twitch is reporting that once Radcliffe wraps up his Broadway run in How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying he will move on to Kill Your Darlings with writer-director John Krokidas. A thriller based on actual events, Kill Your Darlings revolves around the relationship between Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac and Lucien Carr. Carr, for his part, is credited for connecting Ginsberg, Kerouac and William S Burroughs but, most notoriously, served time for the 1944 murder of his lover David Kammerer. Word of the film first broke in 2009 with Christine Vachon (Boys Don't Cry, Hedwig And The Angry Inch, and A Dirty Shame) producing while Chris Evans, Jesse Eisenberg and Ben Whishaw were attached to play Kerouac, Ginsberg and Carr, respectively. It's unknown if any of those three remain attached but Eisenberg, at least, is out with Radcliffe apparently taking his place. Radcliffe's UK based representatives have to date declined comment.

Lady Gaga, who graces the cover of the January issue of Vanity Fair, says, “I have never felt truly cherished by a lover. I have an inability to know what happiness feels like with a man. I say this honestly, and this is my new thing as of the past year: when I fight with someone I’m in a relationship with, I think, What would my fans think if they knew this was happening? How would they feel about my work and about me as a female if they knew I was allowing this to go on? And then I get out.”