The Risky Business of Porn and Viruses
It was a typical day at work on a porn set: a standard three-way. Slick with the sweat of mutual exertions, we were focused intently on performing the XXX Cirque du Soleil-inspired stunts that are typical of porn sex, and I never felt the cut until I saw the blood. This tiny cut, probably from a fingernail, brought the scene to a grinding halt.
Everyone had the same thought on seeing the blood that I did. No one had to say it.
Up until that point, I’d thoughtlessly felt safe from STDs at work. After all, we followed the adult industry protocols. Before the scene, for example, we’d swapped tests declaring us STD/HIV free. But now I started thinking about how those tests were 10 days old. I— or any one of my scene partners that day—could have filmed 10-20 scenes or more in those 10 days, with just as many partners. Add to that a private sex life or maybe some escorting on the side, or perhaps a needle habit… how bad was this? That day I realized being an adult performer meant facing potential exposure to a deadly virus every time I went to work.
Routine HIV/STD testing provided an illusory sense of security but more than that was the trust that develops from years of shooting with the same cadre of co-workers as scene partners. A virus is invisible. You see only the colleague you have always seen and, at least for me, that comfort meant I was able to avoid thinking about the risk.
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Of course, my trust was misplaced. Protocols for stopping the spread of a virus, like all science, is trial and error over time. But in porn, the error is learned only after someone tests positive. When I first entered the business in 2000, syphilis wasn’t included on the monthly panel of tests required for safety. Instead, we tested at random for syphilis every few months. Nobody thought much about this until 2012 when a well-known male performer, Mr. Marcus, shot scenes while infected with syphilis. After that, monthly syphilis testing became more important.
Fortunately, my cut resulted in no permanent issues. With an affected air of normalcy, the director that day tossed me a tube of Neosporin to apply. Then we mapped out the last few positions to avoid the minor injury and finished the scene. For a few days I worried, but time went by and a few clean tests later I let it go.
The pattern continued throughout my career. In order to work, thoughts of risk got pushed away. Then someone caught something on set, worry and fear crept in, and decisions were made: accept the risk to keep working or don’t.
Catching a virus from blood at work is a risk most people don’t run on the job. But COVID-19 spreads through the air and soon the rest of you will know that same feeling I had, and you will be confronted with similar choices.
As states reopen under the ever-present strain of COVID-19, it’ll be a series of lessons in learning how to live with risk—discovering mistakes we can make and those we can’t.
As with syphilis, porn’s current HIV-testing protocols were developed over years of trial and error. And error again means someone’s life has changed forever. In the old days, performers brought paper copies of their latest test to set—a standard practice when I entered the industry, which made it too easy for performers to falsify the results, so in theory those tests had to be confirmed with the issuing medical clinic. But those were only open during normal business hours, which porn set times are not. So if you had a last-minute scene after hours or, say, on a Sunday, you’d have to trust that your co-worker hadn’t changed the date on their test to squeeze an extra week of work out it. Over the years, the system has gotten increasingly rigorous—now it is all online in real time—yet given its past and the unpredictability of viruses, this system might not be as perfect as we all want to believe it is.
“I have a lot of confidence in our system,” adult star Lance Hart says of the current approach. “That’s what has kept all my co-stars, everyone I hire, and myself safe from contracting HIV on set. It works.”
Performer Sophia West notes that when she decided to start shooting adult scenes last year, she derived a sense of safety from the frequent testing. “By doing constant checks on performers, you greatly limit the chances of any type of virus or STD being transmitted to other performers. I won’t perform without a current 14-day test, which is pretty standard in the industry.”
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Porn is one of the few industries where regular virus testing and contract tracing has been a part of the work world for decades. And, so unlike the rest of the country, performers in adult are more ready for COVID-19. It is just one more virus to risk at work.
Nikki Delano, one of the top porn stars on Instagram, thinks adding a COVID-19 test to the standard test panel might give performers peace of mind considering how contagious it is. “We don’t want to bring it home to potentially transmit it to our loved ones with even a kiss on the cheek,” she says. But then, like any experienced adult performer, she quickly realizes the different ways in which airborne COVID-19 would need to be handled versus the STD viruses the porn world is used to tracking. “Would the PA’s, directors, crew, staffing, etc. be tested for COVID-19 due to the fact it’s contagious and not just contractible during sex?” Delano asks.
After a moment’s pause, she continues, “It can be just as simple as not washing your hands 100 percent correctly. Thereafter, passing paperwork to be signed by the talent, handing the papers back to the director, and writing checks and passing them out to everyone on set. Just by those simple actions and equations everyone on set can possibly have contracted COVID-19.”
Delano stresses the importance of practicing good hygiene in every workplace environment.
Other performers are also concerned about how the industry can move forward safely. “I don’t see it as a way to go back to normal shooting. A COVID-19 test is invalid pretty immediately after you take it since you can catch it at any given time,” says porn star Alex Coal. “I’m going to be staying quarantined and only shooting with people quarantined with me. I don’t think the addition of the test is protecting anyone.”
The porn industry is working though this now, in real time. Mike Stabile, a member of the Free Speech Coalition (the adult world’s trade association) is part of the industry’s COVID-19 task force unit. “Nothing is 100 percent perfect or 100 percent safe,” he admits. “There’s always going to be risk in any sexual interaction or, as we know with COVID, in any interaction.”
Stabile says testing and tracing protocols are discussed constantly but without more data on COVID-19 it’s challenging to incorporate a standardized process. “How do we adopt the protocols for a situation where the disease is not only not an STI but we don’t quite know in terms of infection what the incubation rate is?” asks Stabile, before adding, “And we only have a loose idea of what the different transmission risks are.” The answer, as always, is trial and error. But as Stabile also points out, “When you talk about a Hollywood set, someone who is doing a scene is going to be at just as much risk as someone who is going to be on a porn set.”
This path forward—employers trying to limit risk, employees deciding how much risk to accept—while so familiar in porn, will soon be true for almost any workplace.
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