Sex, sex, sex, sex, sex, then AIDS

The United States' insistence on abstinence rather than condoms as a primary way of keeping out HIV, its trade policies and funding methods have drawn furious criticism at the conference, the biggest gathering ever of AIDS scientists, activists, policy makers and HIV-infected people.

Critics say a vow of abstinence is difficult to maintain and, when broken, can lead to unprotected sex, raising the risk of HIV infection that could effectively be blocked by a condom.

Tobias was jeered by protesters chanting "he's lying," "people dying," when he was about to defend U.S. policies in a speech at the conference Wednesday.

would any of these people seriously, i mean seriously, consider having sex with someone who's HIV-positive, even with a condom? would you consider it if you knew that condoms are effective 87% of the time? with that rate, one would assume that the condom is highly effective. it is, if you only have sex with a condom once.

but what if you have sex frequently, let's say 20 times a month, perhaps as a male with multiple partners. a failure rate of 13% multiplied by 20 would mean that there's a possibilty that in those 20 sexual encounters, you would have been infected 2.6 times. small chances, yes; big consequences, definitely, even if the chances are small.

the conference is in thailand, if they need proof about the success of an abstinence program, they should look no further but cross the sea and head to the philippines. for we we're a mystery for most of these morons. while AIDS is spreading throughout the world, especially where condoms have been regularly supplied, our country has not catched up with the trend, perhaps a good side of our "backwardness."

that's why our example is usually ignored by most pro-condom lobbyists. we're an aberration sticking out like a sore thumb since we have a surprisingly tiny number of AIDS cases relative to our large population in spite of the fact that we don't have a condom policy. for a population nearing 80 million, we have less than a thousand cases! why? because our population is not as sexually promiscuous as they are and most of our young men do not really visit prostitutes. we may not have a structured abstinence program or policy set in place by the government, but it is nonetheless ingrained in our culture and morality.

i believe the US is right on this one. feeding condoms into the AIDS problems will be like putting out a fire with petrol.