Adult movie producers in the US have agreed to shut down film sets for several weeks after two performers tested positive for HIV.
At least 45 men and women were under voluntary quarantine because they had sex with the HIV-positive performers or their sex partners, Sharon Mitchell of the non-profit Adult Industry Medical Healthcare Foundation in California said yesterday.
The first performer to test positive, whom Ms Mitchell declined to name, was "conscientious" about having HIV tests every three weeks, she said. On April 9 he tested positive for HIV and a follow-up test on Monday confirmed it.
Ms Mitchell confirmed later yesterday that one of around a dozen women the performer had sex with in films also tested HIV-positive.
A list of quarantined performers was placed on the website of the foundation, which screens around 1,200 adult movie performers a month for HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases.
As of yesterday about a dozen adult movie companies had agreed to follow a voluntary moratorium on production until June 8, said Tim Connelly, publisher of the industry news magazine AVN.
It was unclear how much impact the work stoppage would have on the €2 billion to €7 billion-a-year industry, which is centred in southern California's San Fernando Valley. Some companies have as much as a year's worth of movies ready, said Jill Kelly, a former adult performer turned producer.
The last industry HIV scare was in 1999, when a male performer tested positive for the disease. He no longer performs and no other performers were infected. Before that, a male performer infected five women in 1998.
AP