Bay Area Reporter - July 26, 2001

The report stated that condoms can greatly reduce transmission of HIV and gonorrhea. Scientific evidence is less clear, the report went on to say, as to how condoms protect against other sexually transmitted diseases. The report attributed this conclusion to limited research and called for more studies.

Groups with right-wing connections seized upon the report to denounce the use of condoms and to offer their own "solution" to STD prevention: sex only within a monogamous marriage.

As public health officials and AIDS advocates have been saying for years, condoms are extremely effective in preventing HIV. We've been saying it too, and men who have sex with men should not cease using condoms just because social conservatives operate under the misguided illusion that abstinence is the only form of sex education. It is not. They're burying their heads in the sand and potentially endangering lives when they condemn the use of condoms. While they cling to the belief that abstinence is the only form of STD prevention, it's unrealistic for many, meaning that it fails more often than condoms, as Paul Kawata, executive director of the National Minority AIDS Council pointed out.

No one is saying that condoms are 100 percent effective in preventing HIV and other STDs; however, they significantly reduce the risk of STDs, particularly HIV.

It should come as no surprise that the instigator behind the condom study is former Congressman Tom Coburn, the notorious right winger who had battled with AIDS activists for years before finally leaving the House of Representatives.

Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) and several House colleagues, including Oakland Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D), fired off a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson expressing their frustration over the issue. "Undermining the public's confidence in condoms could lead to decreases in condom use and increases in risky behavior, unwanted pregnancy, and the spread of preventable disease. This would be particularly harmful to efforts to prevent new HIV infections, domestically and internationally, because the presence of another STD infection increases an individual's chance of contracting HIV," they wrote. They urged Thompson to contract with the independent Institute of Medicine to conduct an independent scientific review.

Given San Francisco's recent rise in HIV infection rates, it is imperative that gay and bisexual men continue to practice safer sex, and that means using condoms. While we understand that the message of "Use a condom, every time," is now tiresome to many, without a cure or vaccine, men who have sex with men are putting themselves at greater risk for contracting HIV when having unsafe sex.
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Always watch for outdated information. This article first appeared in 2001. This material is designed to support, not replace, the relationship that exists between you and your doctor.

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