African Epidemic

Fire of Liberty

With the passing of John Paul II and the current conclave, you've had the various talking heads on CNN, MSNBC, NPR, and the Big three networks carry on about the Pope as well as the Vatican failing to confront the HIV/AIDS epidemic in sub-Sahara Africa by promoting abstinence and refusing to allow the usage of condoms. Well, according to this piece by Michael Fumento @ Tech Central Station, the Vatican was on the right track by refusing to accept the fallacy that condoms were the solution to the HIV/AIDS battle. Fumento notes that while a plethora of studies steadily show sex as being the main culprit of such an epidemic, a group of three scholars have decided to climb out of the Ivory Tower and show that the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Africa via sexual transmission only accounts for a 1/3 of the infections. Here's what Famento reveals about what these three renegades say account for the other 2/3:

The chief reason it's so hard to spread HIV vaginally is that, as biopsies of vaginal and cervical tissue show, the virus is unable to penetrate or infect healthy vaginal or cervical tissue. Various sexually transmitted diseases allow vaginal HIV infection, but even those appear to increase the risk only by about 2-4 times.

So if vaginal intercourse can't explain the awful African epidemic, what can? Whatever the role homosexual and bisexual intercourse may play, almost certainly greater -- and more controllable -- contributors to the African epidemic are "contaminated punctures from such sources as medical injections, dental injections, surgical procedures, drawing as well as injecting blood, and rehydration through IV tubes," says Brody.

You don't even need to go to a clinic to be injected with HIV: Almost two-thirds of 360 homes visited in sub-Saharan Africa had medical injection equipment that was apparently shared by family members. This, says Brody, can explain why both a husband and wife will be infected.

For those who care to look, there are many indicators that punctures play a huge role in the spread of disease. For example, during the 1990s HIV increased in Zimbabwe at approximately 12 percent annually, even as condom use increased and sexually transmitted infections rapidly fell.

I'd have to say that the pundits/activists who say that we need to distribute more condoms to prevent the ongoing epidemic in Africa should shy away from the mantra "Sex=HIV/AIDS in Africa," and look at the work of these three scientists. If you look at the facts, you'll be surprised to see that maybe the "Anointed," might not know what they've been espousing for a decade and a half. It's about time individuals like this rock the boat. The question before the house is: Will the policy makers be willing to listen to this differing view?