World AIDS Day Again

Posted by Seth Kramer on Friday, December 1st 2006 at 1:19pm



It's World AIDS day again. 25 years after the discovery of the disease in America we've developed treatment options to allow people suffering from this disease to live long, reasonably healthy lives. That's a great first step, but we've got a long way to go. Here in America there's been a battle to undermine the promotion of safe sex, in favor of abstenance-only programs.

Now I have no problems asking our high and junior high school students not to have sex; I just think it's unrealistic to believe they're going to listen. I mean after all, do you remember when you were in high school? Do you remember how well you and your fellow students listened to your parents and teachers?

But it doesn't just end there. The Bush adminstration's new director of Family Planning Programs, Mr. Eric Keroack, doesn't believe adults--not even married adults--should have access to birth control (not abortion, birth control). Source: The Washington Post.

If we value our children, as well as our adults, we should not be undermining the value of prophylactics like condoms. According to the NIH and the New England Journal of Medicine condoms reduce the risk of HIV/AIDS transmission by about 85%, gonorrhea by 71%, and HPV (a disease only recently found to be linked to cervical cancer) by 70%. Are they perfect no, but they're damn good. If my police precinct prevented 85% of the crimes in my neighborhood I'd buy them all beer and donuts every week.

But that's just America, a nation unfortunately is becoming more scientifically backwards every day. If I had to pick the biggest global enabler in the spread of HIV/AIDs it would be the Catholic church. I like the Catholics; in my experience they're way more committed to social justice than Protestants and for that I applaud them. But on this issue, the church leadership is wrong, deadly wrong.

In 2005 nearly 2,000,000 people died in Sub-Saharan Africa due to HIV/AIDS, and 2/3 of the world's HIV-infected people live in Sub-Saharan Africa even though that region comprises only about 10% of the global population. But because of the Vatican is so stridently opposed to condom use AIDS spreads rampantly. Yes most of the blame should lie with the sexually promiscuous African population, but the church's stubborn refusal to acknowledge that their condom policy is more of a relic than St. Peter's Basilica makes them complicit in these deaths.

Tradition dies hard in the Catholic church, but given the choice between a Catholic population living in sin, and a Catholic population dying in agony. I'll take living in sin anyday.

Regardless, as far as I understand it, Jesus never said "Oh, and by the way, don't use rubbers. It ruins the 'mood'." He was too busy rambling on about taking care of poor people. All of which leads me to believe he would have taken a pretty hard line on sitting with your thumb up your ass letting them die! The church misses the forest for the trees. Of course people should be faithful to their partner. Just like people who go to prison should stay there. But we still put bars on the fucking windows for a reason. Because sometimes people don't live up to the standards we set for them, and the church, of all people, should know this.

If you can and want to, donate to the UN Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria here. 100% of your donation goes to life-saving programs, all overhead is paid by UN member states (aka your tax dollars).

I'm feeling like I'm going to wet myself
I'm spinning NPR