Sex in the UK: how culture and society can define your sexual health

Posted by Share-Net NL on April 22, 2016 at 6:00 am



It’s a Thursday night in central London and a community of men, and some women, are arriving for their monthly gathering.

They enter the nightclub in the city’s Chinatown, located at the southern-most tip of the well-known entertainment district of Soho.  Other nights out in this area begin with quite different intentions, fun and carefree — but not tonight.

Once a month for almost two years, many of those here have been meeting to discuss an issue affecting their lives — and their health. Newcomers come and go, but all those with the courage to attend, benefit from this chance to air their troubles in an open forum with people just like them.

Tonight almost 60 of them have gathered for discussion.

Once inside, they filter downstairs where seats and a stage await them for the night. Upstairs, crowds of men drink and toast the end of another working today, oblivious to the discussions taking place below them.

“After a nine-year relationship with crystal meth, I divorced [the drug] three years ago,” says a man in his twenties, originating from Thailand. He is up on the stage where many will follow suit — and many have preceded him — over the years.

This man, along with many in the room, is here to get clean. More accurately, he’s here to stay clean. The drug he is trying to rid himself free of is not just any drug, it’s part of a select range used by many in the room to have sex. Chemsex.

For the full artcile: http://features.lshtm.ac.uk/project/sex-culture-society-define-sexual-health

Author: Meera Senthilingam
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