An exhaustive review of the impact of condom promotion on actual HIV transmission in the developing world concluded that condoms have not been responsible for turning around any of the severe African epidemics. This rigorous study was originally commissioned by UNAIDS, and conducted by researchers at the University of California at San Francisco. Instead of welcoming the findings, and adapting HIV prevention strategies accordingly, UNAIDS first tried to alter the findings, and ultimately refused to publish them. The findings were so threatening to UNAIDS that the researchers were finally forced to publish them on their own in another, peer-reviewed journal.The report referred to was published by Norman Hearst and Sanny Chen in "Studies in Family Planning" for March 2004. The website of the journal has an abstract of the article. For further discussion, see UNAids and myth of condoms efficacy against Aids in the East African. This refers to another article of interest: "AIDS and the irrational" by Helen Epstein in the BMJ for November 2008. The article by
The National Catholic Bioethics Center will be publishing Matthew Hanley’s book, with Jokin de Irala, M.D., “Avoiding AIDS, Affirming Love: What the West Can Learn from Africa,” this Summer. That should be well worth looking out for.
7 comments:
How interesting but at teh same time how devastating for AIDS sufferers. If the facts don't fit your theory then fudge or suppress the truth and lie to the world, no matter how many die as a consequence. It's all about 'keeping face' and 'your fat cat job' and keep the Pharma-$'s rolling in. What a model humanitarian agency the UN is!
So it's fair to state that UNAIDS is responsible for the deaths of millions through spread of AIDS/HIV and not in fact the Holy Father and the Catholic Church.
Jon Snow please take note and go do some serious investigative reporting.......
Recommendations include increased condom promotion for groups at high risk, more rigorous measurement of the impact of condom promotion, and more research on how best to integrate condom promotion with other prevention strategies. (Studies in Family Planning 2004; 35[1]: 39–47)
The conclusions from the article you qoute doesn't really support the point you were making. In fact, I would say it confirms that hiv prevention strategies are broadly effective but could be refined more by use of strategic targeting of condom use to individuals at higher-risk rather than high-risk populations (-anyway this is generally agreed within the scientific community, the difficulty is how). Furthermore, this report is a qualitative literature review, it is not a meta-analysis of quantitative data and so would not be considered empirically definitive.
big benny - the point that I was making here is that there are some good articles. (Your quote is, of course, from the abstract. I'd be interested to see the full article.) the abstract also says:
"The public health benefit of condom promotion in settings with widespread heterosexual transmission, however, remains unestablished."
He seems to be saying that condoms may be of some use in situations such as prostitution although even there the impact is limited by inconsistent use. The 90% effectiveness figure means that over time, even in a stable relationship, there is a high risk of transmission from an infected partner.
The second article calls into question the policy of targeting high-risk groups. Epstein goes further by saying "The near exclusive emphasis on so called high risk behaviour may be the most destructive misconception about AIDS in Africa."
Epstein nuances the argument somewhat by focussing on the reduction of concurrent partnerships. It is not simply about abstinence but also encouraging faithfulness.
All of these studies undermine the accusation that the Pope is "condemning millions of people to death" - the point I am making more generally.
Now let’s be honest, condoms have nothing to do with trying to prevent the Aids epidemic. Those that produce and promote them know this. They know that they will allow the virus through, and by encouraging rampant sexual behaviour, the governments know that people will be infected, as will their families, so of course the real motivation behind promoting condom use and blocking efforts to utilize standard public health measures is to further ensure the spread of the epidemic. Efforts to approach the AIDS epidemic from a logical point of view have been consistently thwarted, there is so much evidence of this in previous posts on condoms and AIDS.
Now this only points to one thing POPULATION CONTROL.
We are beginning to see the appauling effects of the AIDS epidemic as this modern-day disease begins to depopulate large areas of both Asia and Africa. The Catholic Church is the only hope for preserving the dignity of man, the only bastion of hope for inhabitants of God's earth.
Just look at Margaret Sanger and her work and how she became the cornerstone of Planned Parenthood and other anti life organizations.
None of this is knew and it is being promoted by charities highly favoured by governments that pretend to have mankind foremost in mind. In the UNESCO Courier of November 1991, Jacques Cousteau wrote: "The damage people cause to the planet is a function of demographics - it is equal to the degree of development. This is a terrible thing to say. In order to stabilize world population, we must eliminate 350,000 people per day. It is a horrible thing to say, but it's just as bad not to say it."
We need to stand up for our Pope and what he is trying to do, we must fight for the promotion of the teachings of our mother the Church before it is too late.
"In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up." Martin Niemoeller.
Father, I wouldn't know where to start with your reply. Even the assumptions you make on the risk of infection to a sero-discordant couple using condoms is statistically flawed and ignores other infection co-factors as well as statistical basics.
(Jargon-buster: a "sero-discordant couple" is one in which one partner is HIV positive and the other is HIV negative.)
OK, let's put it this way, following the research conclusions of those such as Weller (who advocate education in the "consistent use of condoms"): the effectiveness of condoms in HIV prophylaxis is "similar to, although lower than, that for contraception."
In other words, not very promising from the point of view of the partner in sexual relationship if you are dealing with a life-threatening infection as opposed to a pregnancy which can be either "terminated" or taken to term.
I think this is a good article on the subject in the online Jesuit magazine 'Thinking Faith', dated 25 March:
http://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/
20090325_1.htm
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