LATATA Withdraws Support for APHSS

LOS ANGELES—The adult industry testing wars are heating up. The Licensed Adult Talent Agents Trade Association (LATATA) has announced its formal withdrawal of support from Free Speech Coalition's Adult Performer Health & Safety Services (APHSS) program.LATATA is an industry organization that was formed among licensed agencies within the adult entertainment business. It's currently comprised of LA Direct Models, Spiegler Girls, Foxxx Modeling, Type 9 Models and ATMLA. "We don't want anyone to dictate where the talent can test one way or the other," a LATATA spokesperson told AVN. "We want both testing facilities to be open and functioning and talent to choose which one they use." LATATA cites APHSS' exclusion of Talent Testing Service (TTS) from membership in its program as "a grievously wrong one." LATATA believes TTS has provided the industry with good service, along with the now defunct AIM, and should continue to do so.  "LATATA firmly believes that it is imperative that the industry never again allow itself to be in such a position where its testing needs are serviced and provided by only one testing facility, and therefore, inclusion of both testing facilities that currently service the industry—Talent Testing Service (TTS) and Cutting Edge Testing (CET)—are necessary in any program that purports to provide assistance and or a framework for performers’ testing needs and related matters. However, there are in fact a number of testing facilities approved by APHSS: St. James Infirmary in San Francisco, Vegas STD Testing with two clinics in Las Vegas, Cutting Edge Testing in Sherman Oaks, Calif. and Advanced Medical Testing Center (AMTC) with physicians in every state and 4,000 locations nationwide. "Despite formidable effort from members of LATATA to bridge the gaps and mediate differences between APHSS and TTS, such efforts have not been successful," LATATA continued. "Absent APHSS admitting TTS to the organization, it is LATATA’s position that it can no longer support APHSS itself, and announces its withdrawal of support and participation in APHSS. LATATA continues to support TTS’ continued service to the industry and the performers within it." FSC Executive Director Diane Duke said that despite its differences, it would welcome TTS as an APHSS member in the event it complies with APHSS' protocols. "The Free Speech Coalition (FSC) welcomes the opportunity to have Talent Testing Service (TTS) as part of our APHSS program," Duke said. "FSC and TTS have come together on some issues but differ on the necessity of initial physician involvement in ordering the test and the provision of results. In the unfortunate case that a performer may test positive for chlamydia or gonorrhea, FSC believes that it is important for a performer to be able to get immediate treatment when he or she receives his or her test results. And if a performer tests positive for HIV, FSC believes it is crucial to get that information from a physician." LATATA said it was faced with a hard choice. "Would we rather have APHSS, which has come in and created itself and said, 'We're going to do what AIM used to do' and has sort of de facto given itself the authority to determine who can test where? We never agreed to that," the LATATA spokesperson said.APHSS was created by FSC in the wake of AIM's closure in order to set forth a best practices guideline and system that allows performers, producers, and agents to create a controlled work environment.It includes consistent standards and guidelines for testing and treatment of adult performers, a secure database that ensures performer privacy, protects producer liability, establishes protocols for performer support in the event of a positive HIV test result—including testing of 1st and 2nd generation partners—as well as health and safety resources provided for producers and performers.TTS has been unable to join APHSS as an approved testing facility because it has not met the organization's requirements, which include having a California-licensed physician affiliated with the testing service's California locations to both prescribe the tests and deliver the results to the performers, and instituting procedures to update the APHSS database when a performer tests positive for an STD. LATATA's announcement comes on the heels of Manwin's statement on June 12, that it would only accept the HIV-1 Aptima RNA Qualitive Assay from APHSS-approved facilities within a 15-day window, starting July 1. LATATA went on to state that despite its withdrawal of support for the FSC's testing subsidiary, it in "no way alters or changes its continued support and gratitude for The Free Speech Coalition itself and the work that it does to benefit all within the adult entertainment industry."