When Steve Sallis, 48, a local member of the leather community, went to get tested for syphilis, he was concerned.

After all, the number of syphilis cases among men who have sex with men in San Diego has increased 1,100 percent since 2000.

Sallis is also HIV-positive, and while syphilis is curable, it can lead to long-term complications, especially for those living with HIV/AIDS.

“It’s always on my mind,” Sallis said.

In collaboration with The San Diego LGBT Commnity Center, Family Health Centers of San Diego, San Diego Young Positives, Bienestar, the San Diego Syphilis Elimination Community Task Force is engaging in a month-long syphilis-screening campaign, designating April as STD Awareness Month.

Through the campaign, the task force is attempting to identify new cases of syphilis among gay men while raising awareness of the need for frequent syphilis testing if risk exists.

Tom Gray, the San Diego Syphilis Elimination Liaison from the California STD Control Branch, said another goal is to try to normalize syphilis testing for gay men.

“I believe that as a community we are fairly good at talking about HIV, but no one ever talks about their experiences with syphilis or syphilis testing,” Gray said, noting many gay men and other men who have sex with men (MSM) in San Diego are aware of the rise in syphilis cases among them.

What they are not aware of is that syphilis had been on the verge of elimination in San Diego in the late 1990s.

“Only 11 years ago, we had a year where we only had one case of primary/secondary syphilis among gay men in San Diego,” he said.

Those with primary- and secondary-stage syphilis are a high concern for health professionals.

“Primary and secondary cases … are highly infectious and often missed by the infected persons and their health care provider, unless they are thinking syphilis,” Gray said.

Rafael Acevedo, 33, can relate.

In 2004, two years after he tested HIV-positive, Acevedo noticed a sore on his penis. He went to his doctor at the time but the doctor misdiagnosed the sore as herpes.

Syphilis, known as “the great imitator,” is sometimes misdiagnosed because its signs and symptoms are similar to other diseases. When a person is first infected and in the primary stage of syphilis, a painless ulcer emerges at the site of the infection, often looking like a herpes sore, called a chancre. It can be in the throat, mouth, rectum, penis or vagina. Without treatment, the chancre goes away after a couple of weeks and is followed by a rash on the palm of the hands, soles of the feet or trunk of the body. This is known as secondary syphilis.

The rash often disappears in a few weeks and people often mistake it for an allergic reaction to detergent or soap.

Once the chancre and rash clear, the virus usually lies dormant for years, but it continues to take its toll on the human body.

If left untreated, syphilis bacteria can severely damage the body’s organs as it travels throughout the body. The final stage, called latent syphilis, can result in mental illness, blindness, other neurological problems, heart disease and death.

According to doctors, syphilis develops much more rapidly in HIV-positive people, sometimes with both the first and second stages occurring at the same time.

In San Diego, approximately 55-60 percent of gay male cases of syphilis are co-infected with HIV.

After having been misdiagnosed, and having been prescribed Valtrex – a medication to suppress the herpes virus, which is not effective against syphilis, Acevedo sought further treatment.

“I still had the sores. So I went back again to my physician at the time and again he didn’t seem to be listening. I was really scared and frustrated and started to freak out because I was not getting treated,” he said.

Relief came after going to the County Office of Health and Human Services, STD clinic on Rosecrans Street – just one of the many places syphilis testing is offered throughout the county.

“Within five minutes of dropping my drawers, the nurse there immediately knew what it was and said not to worry and explained I would receive the proper treatment,” he said.

“I was so relieved that I gave her a hug. I basically became a showcase for everyone there. I showed my penis to everybody, because it became a teaching moment.”

Acevedo said he is grateful for the services he received from the health department and wanted to do what he could to ensure that other young HIV-positive men, who are at the highest risk are educated, tested and treated early.

“Many people who are HIV-positive think, screw it, they already have the worst thing they possibly can get, but co-infection with syphilis and HIV can lead to far worse problems, with both enhancing the toll the other takes on the body,” Acevedo, who is also the founder and secretary of Young Positives, an HIV-support group for young men, explained.

In order to help drive down the number of syphilis cases in San Diego among gay men, health care providers, formed the San Diego Syphilis Elimination Community Task Force.

The first meeting was held last August. It was there that Dr. Davey Smith, San Diego’s leading expert in infectious diseases, laid out the plan.

If the group really wanted to reduce the prevalence of syphilis in gay men, we needed to test as many men as possible in a short amount of time, treat those who test positive, work to find any sex partners they may have had during the time they were infectious and test and treat those folks, Smith said.

With that, the idea of a syphilis-screening blitz was born, and the group designated April as STD Awareness Month in San Diego.

To that end, Young Positives is assisting the San Diego Syphilis Elimination Community Task Force with community outreach – talking with others and educating them about syphilis and getting tested.

“Once you know what it is, the treatment is incredibly easy,” Acevedo explained.

Depending on the stage of infection, syphilis can often be treated with a series of bicillen shots. And Acevedo said he started to notice improvements in his health very soon after he was treated.

“Not only did I feel better, but the psychological impact was also such a relief. To know that someone knew what it was and listened to me when I said something’s not right here. For them to be able treat it so effectively and quickly, that was the biggest relief.”

As for Sallis, he too is relieved: His syphilis test came back negative.

“Still, I’ve been sitting in on the meetings for about four months now. I’ve been doing my quiet little thing out in the leather community – just talking to people, doing a lot of one on one with people, discussing syphilis and trying to take the stigma off of it,” Sallis said.

“You know, I know of people who can talk about their HIV status and counts and everything else in church on Sunday, but they would not dare use the word syphilis.”