Posted by Alan on August 27, 2003 at 09:01:45
One member of this forum has called my postings regarding the transmission of HIV "hearsay." Another wrote that my assertion that abstinence and monogamy are the only sure-fire methods of avoiding STDs was "tilting at windmills." For those of you who still possess an open mind regarding this debate, I am providing some web addresses where you will find the data which supports my previous statements. The truth is out there, you just have to be willing to seek it.
Concerning the ineffectiveness of condoms for preventing STDs:
http://www.choosetoday.org/ineffectiveness/
http://www.sma.org/smj/97feb7.htm
Facts regarding Uganda's successful campaign against HIV:
http://www.family.org/cforum/feature/a0021550.cfm
http://www.family.org/cforum/fosi/purity/ppi/a0026828.cfm
http://www.family.org/cforum/feature/a0019748.cfm
http://www.family.org/cforum/feature/a0026107.cfm
http://www.family.org/welcome/press/a0026229.cfm
(Note: The above family.org web addresses are in no way connected to the Children of God/Family cult. They belong to Focus on the Family, a ministry of nationally renowned Christian psychologist and author Dr. James Dobson.)
I have pasted below a portion of an article concerning the successful Ugandan campaign to drastically reduce AIDS in that African nation. It clearly refutes AnovaGrrl's assumption that condoms are responsible for Uganda's success. This article can be found at:
http://www.family.org/cforum/feature/a0021550.cfm
Uganda: AIDS Success Story
What does work? Indeed, while HIV/AIDS infection rates in many African countries are increasing, Gramckow pointed out that the rates in some African nations — notably Uganda — actually have been decreasing dramatically. Why? Abstinence.
While some try to credit condoms for the improvement, Dr. Edward C. Green, of the Harvard School of Public Health, does not.
Green, who examined the Ugandan experience scientifically, wrote in a recent report: "Few in public health circles really believed — or even believe nowadays — that programs promoting abstinence, fidelity or monogamy, or even reduction in number of sexual partners, pay off in significant behavioral change. My own view of this changed when I evaluated HIV prevention programs in Uganda and Jamaica."
Green said that when Ugandan President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni began to enlist help from religious organizations in 1992, many secular AIDS workers thought abstinence education programs would have few, if any, measurable results.
Indeed, in a November 1991 speech, Museveni called for a return to "old-fashioned" morals.
"I have been emphasizing a return to our time-tested cultural practices that emphasized fidelity and condemned premarital and extramarital sex," he said.
Could a return to "old-fashioned" morals significantly reduce the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Uganda? According to Green, HIV prevalence rates dropped 70 percent between 1991 and 2001.
He added in his study: "Some reports continue to claim that the world's great success story in AIDS prevention, Uganda, owes its achievement to condoms, but this is not true."
In fact, the Uganda AIDS Commission policy
specifically recommended the following steps:
Seek prompt treatment for any STD (sexually transmitted disease) infection and have regular check-ups.
Have self-confidence and esteem skills as a method of preventing AIDS.
Practice safe behavior, which involves:
Abstaining from sex before and outside of marriage.
Avoiding drugs and alcohol.
Avoiding people who are bad influences.
Condom use was not listed among the commission's recommendations. Indeed, as Dr. Vinand Nantulya, an infectious-disease specialist, pointed out in his analysis
of the Uganda plan: "Ugandans never took to condoms."
Nantulya credits Uganda's "zero-grazing" — or marital fidelity — campaign as the major reason for Uganda's success in fighting HIV/AIDS. Green added that according to the Demographic and Health Survey, 95 percent of all Ugandans age 15 to 49 now report practicing monogamy or abstinence."