LONDON (AFP) – The world’s first “theme park” dedicated to sex and relationships is set to open in London’s bustling West End later this summer, its promoters said.

Amora: The Academy of Sex and Relationships, featuring “high-tech and interactive exhibits together with new media displays,” expects up to 600,000 visitors within its first year in the Trocadero Centre at Piccadilly Circus.

“Titillation is not the goal,” the promoters — who include sexologist and self-help book author Sarah Brewer — said in a statement, refuting comparisons with museums of erotica in Amsterdam, Barcelona and Paris.

“Our vision is to build a Kinsey-type institute in Europe for Generation X and Y to bring modern thinking around sexuality. … It truly is the world’s first theme park dedicated to sex and relationships.

FAJARA, Gambia (Reuters) – The young Gambian man in the yellow string vest calls out to a European woman walking along a wide golden beach shrouded in a fine sea mist.

“Hey nice lady! Nice lady, I want to talk to you,” he yells. She keeps walking.

“It’s nice to be nice,” he grumbles as he returns to his friends, his matted hair escaping from his cap.

The young man is one of Gambia’s “bumsters,” youths who offer to walk with tourists as they visit markets and beaches in this tiny West African nation and who fend off the attentions of rivals for a small fee.

What is left unsaid but understood is the possibility of a more intimate relationship, that could be a ticket, however temporary, out of poverty.

A week-long relationship could mean three hot meals a day for the Gambian man and a luxury hotel bed to sleep in, plus money for beer or cigarettes.

“I experienced one time when there was a young boy who was trying to get me to his house for ‘the real Gambian Experience’ as they call it,” said Wilma, 35, from the Netherlands.

“It was very hard to get rid of him. Yes, he was trying to sell himself,” said Wilma, who did not want to give her surname.

In many African countries, it is common to see older white men with young local black women, but Gambia, along with some resorts in neighboring Senegal, has earned a name as a place for older European women to meet young African men.

Now a British hotel manager is working to get the bumsters off the beaches and into legitimate jobs in order to improve Gambia’s image.

Precise numbers for the sex tourism industry are hard to get. A 2003 report by UNICEF said 60-70 percent of visitors to one of the main tourist areas near the capital Banjul were there for “sun relaxation and cheap sex.”

Flights from Britain regularly arrive with a high proportion of women traveling alone, often visiting younger Gambian men they met on previous visits.

A lasting relationship can mean continued financial support — invaluable in a country ranked as one of the 25 poorest in the world — and, if all goes well, a visa to live in Europe.

For European women, it is a chance to have a young and potentially attractive holiday companion.

But for those not interested in a liaison with a local man, being approached in this way can be unpleasant — and that was what spurred British hotelier Geri Mitchell to create jobs for the men annoying her guests.

Mitchell, 52, who manages The Safari Garden Hotel, a leafy oasis in the Fajara beach area near Banjul, selected a group of young men and sent them to train as tourist guides.

They now charge tourists a set rate of 30 Dalasi ($1) an hour or 50 Dalasi ($1.75) for a one-off trip. The hotel offers them a formal introduction to the guests.

The project, which built on a previous government initiative to train reformed bumsters as guides, has provided much needed financial relief to Lamine Bojang, a guide in his mid-twenties.

Bojang’s father died when he was young and so he is the family’s chief earner, and has to pay his siblings’ school fees.

“In my family, I play a big role,” he said.

Before becoming guides, Bojang and his friends used to collect firewood in the forest and sell it to make ends meet.

Now, they say, they are able to make a basic living and they have earned the respect of the hotel and its guests.

Part of the guides’ training involves learning how to recognize and report sex tourism involving an underage person.

The majority of prostitutes in the tourist area near Banjul where the guides work, are underage, with some as young as 12, according to the UNICEF report.

The U.N. agency has also said it is concerned the former British colony is increasingly becoming a destination for sex tourists as countries in southeast Asia take steps to shake off their image as havens for pedophiles.

Mitchell said the tourist guides also help monitor sex tourism.

“That’s a message that we really want to get out to sex tourists: don’t come, because everybody is out there and taking responsibility for what’s going on,” she said.

Rachel, 25, traveled alone from Britain to Gambia for a holiday, and praised efforts to deal with the bumsters.

“I just think the worst thing about the Gambia is that you can’t step outside of your hotel for a minute without being hassled. I think the Gambia would be a much better place without that. I think official tour guides are probably the best way of doing that,” she said.

LARNACA, Cyprus (Reuters) – Costas Kyriakou is promising Cypriot voters Utopia and that means sex.

A colorful candidate among a sea of suited businessmen and lawyers, Kyriakou says he is offering voters an alternative in the island’s May 21 parliamentary elections.

“My new order will give people … lots of love for all,” he says.

His nickname, “Utopos,” combines two Greek words which coined the term “Utopia,” meaning “No Place.”

A strapping man with piercing blue eyes, he draws on ideas from Plato and Christian apocalyptic scriptures for his ideal city-state where people live in communes and share everything.

But central to his Utopia is sex, a campaign pledge which draws guffaws of disbelief from deeply conservative Cypriots.

“I propose a regime of free love,” he declares.

“The men will see it as a system of free love, the women as a matriarchy … they will be able to carry the sperm of the most handsome men, and give the child her name.”

Utopos, an independent candidate for the western region of Paphos, has hit the campaign trail running. Literally.

Sporting a black bandana, jeans and sandals, he has crossed most Cypriot towns on foot, chatting with locals and handing out his pamphlets.

Utopos, 48, quit philosophy school in his third year and is now a farmer. “I knew more than they did. I was against others trying to stuff my head with ideas.”

It is his second run for parliament, which he sees as a stepping stone to the presidency.

He ran in the presidential election of 2003, where he won 0.44 percent of the vote, the highest figure among a smattering of fringe non-party candidates.

Utopos disputes this. “I received 73 percent,” he said.

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – During the past decade, there has been a significant increase in the proportion of teenagers and young adults engaging in oral sex and, less commonly, having anal intercourse, according to data from STD clinics in Baltimore, Maryland.

The finding is not all that surprising, Dr. Emily Erbelding from Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center in Baltimore told Reuters Health.

She explained that “a few national surveys conducted recently have suggested that oral sex may be a behavior that teenagers are increasingly participating in. For example, in the 2002 National Survey of Family Growth, most teenagers reported having oral sex and many had not had intercourse.”

She presented the current study findings Tuesday in Jacksonville, Florida at the 2006 National STD Prevention Conference sponsored by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In examining the 1994 medical records of 2,598 12- to 25-year olds, and the 2004 medical records of 6,438 subjects of the same age, attending STD clinics in Baltimore, Erbelding and colleagues found that over the 10-year period the prevalence of self-reported oral sex in the previous 90 days doubled among males (from 16 percent to 32 percent) and more than doubled among females (from 14 percent to 38 percent).

There was also an increase in rectal sex among young women, “but it was a lot less common than oral sex,” Erbelding said. Among young women, the prevalence of self-reported anal sex over the period rose from 3 percent to 5.5 percent.

There may be a general feeling out there that oral sex is safer than intercourse, Erbelding said, and it probably is for some diseases.

However, Erbelding emphasized that oral and anal sex may result in the transmission of STDs that will not be detected in urine tests. “A urine test is not going to pick up gonorrhea or Chlamydia that might have been acquired through rectal or oral sex, with gonorrhea being the more significant infection for oral sex.”

Therefore, “clinicians need to routinely ask their adolescent and young adult patients about the full range of sexual behaviors and educate young people in general about what the relative risks are for different types of STDs for various sexual behaviors,” Erbelding said.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Around the world, middle-aged and elderly men tend to be more satisfied with their sex lives than women in the same age group, a survey released on Wednesday said.

Substantial majorities of people who are married or who have a partner remain sexually active throughout the second half of their lives, according to a survey of 27,500 people aged 40 to 80 in 29 countries.

“There was very little effect of age on sexual well-being,” though other factors such as health problems or depression had a substantial impact, said lead researcher Edward Laumann of the University of Chicago in a telephone interview.

The survey published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior looked at how they viewed their sex lives, their health, and their happiness.

It found that a greater proportion of people in Europe, North America, and Australia, where men and women have more or less equal relations, enjoyed sex physically and emotionally, Laumann said.

A smaller percentage of people reported satisfying sex lives in male-dominated cultures in poorer countries, the research showed.

But the gender gap persisted around the world.

“There’s a systematic disparity between men and women, where men are on the average substantially — or about 10 points — higher in their levels of satisfaction as women in that country,” he said.

Most of those surveyed at random were married, though there was an obvious bias toward participants who were willing to talk about sex, and toward urban populations in less-developed nations.

“Pleasure is not part of the story” in sexually conservative cultures in the Far East — China, Indonesia, Japan, Taiwan, and Thailand, Laumann said. “Procreation is the rationale for sex. Many women … characterize sex as dirty, as a duty, something they endure” — and often stop having it after age 50.

But roughly two-thirds of adults in Western nations reported their sex lives were very to extremely satisfying — though some countries appeared happier than others.

Roughly four out of five middle-aged to older Austrians, for instance, rated their sex lives highly, while considerably fewer adults in France and Sweden shared that sentiment.

In the United States, about three-quarters of men and two-thirds of women reported they were very satisfied with the physical and emotional aspects of their sex lives.

In Japan, by contrast, just 18 percent of the men and 10 percent of the women answered positively about their sex lives. And in Taiwan, only 7 percent of the women said sex was very important in their lives.

Satisfying sex is not the same as a satisfying sexual relationship, Laumann said the survey showed.

“People who are dating have higher levels of sexual satisfaction than (married) couples … but when they think the relationship is temporary, they’re not going to feel as positive about sex,” he said.

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Young men who feel good about their looks are more likely than their peers with a less positive body image to engage in risky sexual behavior, a new study of college students shows.

The men who were most satisfied with their appearance, and the most appearance-oriented — meaning they were highly invested in their looks and considered appearance to be important — were also the most likely to have sex without condoms and to have sex with multiple partners, Dr. Eva S. Lefkowitz of Pennsylvania State University in University Park and colleagues report.

“There’s kind of a general belief that a positive view of your body is a good thing,” Lefkowitz said in an interview with Reuters Health. “We’re not saying that’s not true, but we do think in the case of young men there could be potential negative ramifications of a positive view of one’s body.”

Among young women, in contrast, those with a more positive body image were less likely to engage in risky sexual behavior, Lefkowitz and her team found.

The researchers interviewed 434 students, ranging in age from 17 to 19, during their first year of college. Fifty-nine percent reported being sexually active. Just over two-thirds of sexually active students said they didn’t use condoms every time they had sex, while a little over half said they used alcohol while having sex at least some of the time.

While sexually active students reported less dissatisfaction with their looks and a more positive body image on average, “it’s important to point out that we don’t know which comes first,” Lefkowitz said. People who feel better about their looks may be more likely to have sex, or being sexually active may confer a better body image, she explained.

As the researchers hypothesized, men with better body images had more lifetime sex partners and were less likely to use condoms during sex, while women who felt more positively about their looks had fewer partners and used condoms more frequently.

The findings show, Lefkowitz and her team conclude, that high self-esteem in terms of appearance may not be protective for young men, but instead may put them in danger of taking risks sexually.

Parents sending sons off to college may want to consider “really emphasizing not just go forth and feel good about yourself, but also within those messages emphasizing the importance of protecting yourself and respect for women,” Lefkowitz advised.

SAN FRANCISCO – In Atlanta, an online ad offers a room in exchange for “sex and light office duty.” In Los Angeles, a one-bedroom pool house is free “to a girl that is skilled and willing.” And in New York City, a $700-a-month room is available at a discount to a fit female willing to provide sex.

On the widely used Web site Craigslist.org, some landlords and apartment dwellers looking for roommates are offering to accept sex in lieu of rent.

“They have to be attractive. I don’t let just anybody come into my house,” said Mike, a man who answered the phone at the New York City listing but declined to give his last name — and refused to say whether he has, in fact, collected the rent under the sheets.

The offering of shelter for sex is older than, well, real estate itself.

But the online come-ons are franker than anything you might see in the newspaper classifieds, because they are not edited by Craigslist, and perhaps also because the anonymity of the Internet often causes people to shed their inhibitions.

Trading housing for sex is a form of prostitution. But the police aren’t kicking down doors.

Paul J. Browne, a deputy police commissioner in New York, said investigators have found that the Craigslist ads are frequently “little more than a form of voyeurism that didn’t result in an actual exchange of sex for rent.”

Craigslist provides mostly free classifieds for apartments, used cars and just about everything else in more than 200 cities in 35 countries.

“I usually rent the room for 600, but if you are really ticklish and willing to trade being tickled for the extra rent then we have a deal,” writes a gay man offering a $350-a-month room in the San Francisco Bay area.

An ad for a townhouse near Bradenton, Fla., seeks a “female that likes to be nude. Nothing more expected.”

It is unclear how much success people have had with their rent-for-sex ads.

One man said he became friends with a bisexual man who answered his ad but did not end up taking the room. The same user said a man visiting from Russia answered his ad and they shared dinner and a bottle of wine, but that was it.

“This is only a silly sideline adventure of mine,” the man, who would not give his name, wrote in an e-mail. “I feel a little embarrassed about it.”

The Associated Press e-mailed more than two-dozen other people who placed ads, but most declined to be interviewed.

Jim Buckmaster, chief executive of San Francisco-based Craigslist, said the company forbids ads that break the law, but his staff of 19 could not possibly police all postings. Craigslist instead relies on users to flag ads they find offensive. If enough people agree, the ad is removed.

“Tens of millions of users are a much more powerful force in examining the more than 8 million classified ads per month than any staff could be,” Buckmaster said.

Mike, who offered the room in New York, said his ads are frequently flagged and removed, resulting in a cat-and-mouse game in which he puts them back up.

Tenants rights groups have accused Craigslist of skirting fair housing requirements. In February, a group called the Chicago Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law sued the Web site for publishing housing ads that excluded people based on their race, religion and sex.

But legal experts say Craigslist is shielded by a 1996 federal law that protects online service providers that merely pass along unedited information provided by someone else.

And in most states, prostitution laws apply only if the ads are followed by e-mails, phone conversations or other acts that advance the proposition.

“The mere posting itself is absolutely not illegal,” said Anthony Lowenstein, a defense lawyer in San Francisco, “unless the guy who posts it or the person who answers it does something that makes it a little closer to happening.”

LONDON (Reuters) – Doctors called on Friday for more research into a very rare, poorly understood syndrome that is the opposite of the most common sexual complaint in women.

Instead of failing to get aroused, women suffering from persistent sexual arousal syndrome (PSAS) experience constant, unprovoked feelings of excitement.

“Persistent sexual arousal syndrome occurs when a woman becomes involuntarily aroused for extended periods of time in the absence of sexual desire,” said Dr David Goldmeier, of St Mary’s Hospital in London.

But rather than being a pleasant sensation, Goldmeier, who described PSAS in a report in the International Journal of STD & AIDS, said it is embarrassing and very distressing for women.

Some sufferers have reported being suicidal, he added.

In the majority of cases the cause is unknown but a number of women report symptoms after they stop taking antidepressants known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors.

Because so few cases have been studied, little is known about the prevalence of the problem or the best treatments for a condition that was first diagnosed in 2001.

“It deserves continued research, not only because it is a distressing and perplexing condition, but also because … treatment may lead to greater understanding of other aspects of female sexual response,” said Goldmeier and Dr Sandra Leiblum of the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in Piscataway, New Jersey.

The International Journal of STD & AIDS is published by the Royal Society of Medicine in London.

TORONTO (Reuters) – When it comes to sex and romance, aging Canadian baby boomers spend a lot more time watching television or surfing the net, according to a new study.

The survey by pollsters Ipsos Reid, commissioned by Pfizer Inc., the maker of Viagra, found that Canadians between the ages of 40 and 64 spend an average of 15 minutes a day on sex and romance, but can spend as much as five hours a day watching TV or surfing the Internet.

“Later in life, you have a different perspective of what sex is all about,” John Wright, an Ipsos Reid spokesman, said on Thursday.

Of 2,500 people surveyed, more than half said they were often too tired to have sex, while 42 percent said they were too stressed out and 40 percent said they did not have time.

Around half of the respondents said when they do have sex it is intimate and tender.

Wright said another yet-to-be released study found that 37 percent of Canadians over 55 prefer a good night of sex to a good night of sleep, indicating that sex is still important to that age group.

“I think the last two decades have opened up sexuality as far as (older) couples engaging in a variety of sexual activities,” he said. “There’s been much more openness about this… sex shops abound.”

Linda Proulx, owner of Winnipeg, Manitoba’s Love Nest boutiques, said the boomers’ preference for watching TV is not such a bad thing. She said many of her customers are baby boomers and senior citizens who have taken a cue from television and decided to rejuvenate their sex life.

“People are spending time watching TV, but it is bringing them into our stores,” she said, noting that more television shows have sexual themes. “They’re buying the products to maybe help them engage in a more intimate or longer sex act because of something they’ve seen on TV.”

The Ipsos Reid survey found that even though boomers are having less sex, only 28 percent say it is less enjoyable now than it was in their 20s, and more than 80 percent say sex makes them feel loved and appreciated.

LONDON (Reuters) – Forget pretending you are talking to one person or concentrating on a single point in the audience — having sex is good way to calm nerves before giving a speech or presentation.

But Stuart Brody, a psychologist at the University of Paisley in Scotland, said it has to be full sexual intercourse to get the best results.

He studied nearly 50 men and women who recorded their sexual activities for two weeks and analysed its impact on their blood pressure levels when under acute stress, such as when giving a speech.

Brody discovered that the volunteers who had sexual intercourse were the least stressed and had blood pressure levels that returned to normal more quickly than people who engaged in other types of sex.

But people who had abstained from sex had the highest blood pressure response to stress.

Even after taking into account stress due to work or other factors, the range of responses to stress were best explained by sexual behaviour.

“The effects are not attributable simply to the short-term relief afforded by orgasm but rather, endure for at least a week,” Brody told New Scientist magazine said on Wednesday.

He believes that the release of the so-called “pair bonding” hormone oxytocin might explain the calming effect.