from www.laweekly.com – It looks like porn stars in California will see stricter safety rules on how they do their thing on-set. Just like a construction worker has to wear a hardhat, they might have to don condoms and submit to tests.

At least according to our reading of coverage of a state workplace-safety meeting on the topic, and according to our parsing of a statement put out by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation.

Deborah Gold, seniors safety engineer for the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health (Cal/OSHA), said new amendments to state rules would be presented to an advisory meeting in downtown L.A. June 7, where you, the public, could weigh in.

While California already requires condoms in porn (but doesn’t really enforce the rule), the new language would specifically address “routine and post-exposure medical services may need to be adopted to reduce these risks” of contracting non-blood-born STDs, Gold said last week.

Sounds like mandatory testing to us.

AHF thinks condoms will be more specifically addressed. State and federal rules say you shouldn’t be mixing blood at work. Sounds good to us. Cal/OSHA officials say that means condoms.

But state officials “are drafting rules that are specific to the industry” for the first time, AHF spokeswoman Lori Yeghiayan tells the Weekly.

“It is our hope is that the amendments will make specific reference to condoms,” she says.

The porn world in L.A. already tests its performers regularly. But that hasn’t stopped diseases, including an HIV-positive scandal for one gay performer last year.

The industry argues that forcing condoms on it will only push production outside the San Fernando Valley and into the “underground,” where there will be no testing.

Michael Weinstein [pictured], the group’s honcho, states:

As a global HIV and STD medical care provider, we’ve seen it as our duty to pursue action on this issue of safety in the workplace–in these instances, unprotected sex acts taking place in albeit non-traditional workplaces–the porn sets located in the San Fernando Valley and throughout California. We heartily thank Deborah Gold for her tireless work on this issue and for speaking out publicly on Cal/OSHA’s behalf last week about these proposed new safety amendments.