A new report on the number of District residents living with HIV and AIDS showed that 3.2 percent of the city, triple the standard World Health Organization rate for an epidemic, still suffer from the afflictions -- but the report did note a decline in the number of new cases. more ›

If anyone was hoping that the latest iteration of the National Survey of Family Growth -- a measure of the sex lives of American citizens conducted by the federal government -- would clear anything up, well, you're in for a disappointment. So what stats can we pick at? Well, it appears as if something's going on between the ages of 24 and 25 in this country: more than a quarter of men and women aged 15-24 said they'd never had sexual contact, but in the 25-44 group, you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who hadn't had intercourse. Let's see, what else? Well, 44 percent of men age 25-44 report having had anal sex, which is probably a bit higher than you'd guess. Hmm, what else -- oh, and here's a good one: 13 percent of women and 5 percent of men reported engaging in some "same-sex sexual behavior," whatever that means. Of course, trying to draw conclusions about a subject as universal and vast as sexual behavior from a group of 13,495 men and women aged 15 to 44 that were questioned several years ago is kind of like trying to put out a blaze with a Super Soaker -- but at least you can't ever accuse DCist of not giving you something to talk about during happy hour. more ›

Look, Washington Examiner, we know you're bummed out about not actually having crime-fighting superpowers. We would be too! But that's no reason to start wildly promoting the idea that pedestrian accidents are on the rise exclusively because Michelle Obama is encouraging people to fight obesity by walking. more ›

Yesterday, the National Alliance to End Homelessness released its annual report on the State of Homelessness in America -- and the news for the District and the country as a whole is not good. According to the study, D.C. joined 31 states which experienced an increase in its overall homeless population. Meanwhile, the homeless population in the United States rose by 20,000 people between 2008 and 2009, a three percent increase. more ›

We were eagerly anticipating the findings of the National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior -- a comprehensive survey of 5,865 people, ranging in age between 14 and 94 and of various backgrounds and orientations -- which were released to the public yesterday. Want some interesting factoids? This thing's got them in spades. The survey proves definitively that sex, like race, is so much more than simply gay and straight (as if we didn't already know that) -- there were 40 combinations of sexual activity described by the participants as their most recent sexual event. Men think that women have an orgasm in 85 percent of sexual encounters, while women claimed they only climax 64 percent of the time. Men prefer getting right to knocking boots; women prefer a melange of sexual activities. Plus, we couldn't help but notice that pretty much every media outlet utilized the same (admittedly fantastic) AP file photo to illustrate their reports. more ›

The authors (and dare we say, the readers) of this web site often get pretty exercised over pedestrian and cyclist safety issues, especially when so many of these kinds of accidents seem to involve city bus drivers. But a new study of relative pedestrian safety finds that D.C. is actually one of the safer cities in the country to be traveling through without an automobile. According to Transportation for America, a transportation advocacy group, walking in Washington is less dangerous than in 31 other metro areas in the U.S. more ›