Pope say condom use makes AIDS worse...

[Chizzang]

I thought of another way of expressing this, in a clearer fashion.

Here in New York, there is a lottery game, "Sweet Million," a pick-6 game in which no number can repeat, and in which you select numbers from "1" to "40." The odds of winning the grand prize of $1,000,000 is about 1:3.5 million.

If you were to buy every single combination of those 40 numbers, every ticket you hold would have a 1:3.5 million chance of being a winner; but your overall chance of winning would be a 100% (statistical certainty).

(We will put aside for the moment the fact that you spent $3.5 million to win a $1M).

Um...
based on the information you posted I calculated the odds and 1 in 3.5M is not correct,I get 1 in 3.28M

[Col Hogan]

I thought of another way of expressing this, in a clearer fashion.

Here in New York, there is a lottery game, "Sweet Million," a pick-6 game in which no number can repeat, and in which you select numbers from "1" to "40." The odds of winning the grand prize of $1,000,000 is about 1:3.5 million.

If you were to buy every single combination of those 40 numbers, every ticket you hold would have a 1:3.5 million chance of being a winner; but your overall chance of winning would be a 100% (statistical certainty).

(We will put aside for the moment the fact that you spent $3.5 million to win a $1M).

Um...
based on the information you posted I calculated the odds and 1 in 3.5M is not correct,I get 1 in 3.28M

What's .22m among friends????

[JoltinJoe]

I thought of another way of expressing this, in a clearer fashion.

Here in New York, there is a lottery game, "Sweet Million," a pick-6 game in which no number can repeat, and in which you select numbers from "1" to "40." The odds of winning the grand prize of $1,000,000 is about 1:3.5 million.

If you were to buy every single combination of those 40 numbers, every ticket you hold would have a 1:3.5 million chance of being a winner; but your overall chance of winning would be a 100% (statistical certainty).

(We will put aside for the moment the fact that you spent $3.5 million to win a $1M).

Um...
based on the information you posted I calculated the odds and 1 in 3.5M is not correct,I get 1 in 3.28M

I said "about 1:3.5." I did a quickie calculation; didn't really multiply all the way out. I still have a job ... still waiting for my big break and I'll join you in retirement.

[Chizzang]

Um...
based on the information you posted I calculated the odds and 1 in 3.5M is not correct,I get 1 in 3.28M

What's .22m among friends????

I believe the State - if posting winning odds on the backs of tickets must be calculating the "actual" odds as in the idea that somebody were to buy every possible combination - of which there are 3.28Million possibilities and they add to that chaos theory as well as error probabilities in ticket buying sequences...

thus the 1 in 3.5M calculation...
because the actual number of possible number sequences is 3,280,841

[JoltinJoe]

What's .22m among friends????

I believe the State - if posting winning odds on the backs of tickets must be calculating the "actual" odds as in the idea that somebody were to buy every possible combination - of which there are 3.28Million possibilities and they add to that chaos theory as well as error probabilities in ticket buying sequences...

thus the 1 in 3.5M calculation...
because the actual number of possible number sequences is 3,280,841

I don't know what the posted odds are. I seriously just ball-parked the number.

[Chizzang]

I believe the State - if posting winning odds on the backs of tickets must be calculating the "actual" odds as in the idea that somebody were to buy every possible combination - of which there are 3.28Million possibilities and they add to that chaos theory as well as error probabilities in ticket buying sequences...

thus the 1 in 3.5M calculation...
because the actual number of possible number sequences is 3,280,841

I don't know what the posted odds are. I seriously just ball-parked the number.

After doing some chaos theory and error inclusion the odds are even higher...
If I was a state lottery official I would post the "official odds" 1 in 3.28M with a few addenda - because the Odds vs. probability vs. statistics is crazy...

somewhere around 7M to 1

[JoltinJoe]

I don't know what the posted odds are. I seriously just ball-parked the number.

After doing some chaos theory and error inclusion the odds are even higher...
If I was a state lottery official I would post the "official odds" 1 in 3.28M with a few addenda - because the Odds vs. probability vs. statistics is crazy...

somewhere around 7M to 1

Huh??

As a practical matter, there can be valid reasons to assess error and chaos -- as a theoretical matter, though, what I said was right: if you buy every combination (meaning that you in fact hold every combination), you have a 100% chance of winning.

[Chizzang]

After doing some chaos theory and error inclusion the odds are even higher...
If I was a state lottery official I would post the "official odds" 1 in 3.28M with a few addenda - because the Odds vs. probability vs. statistics is crazy...

somewhere around 7M to 1

Huh??

As a practical matter, there can be valid reasons to assess error and chaos -- as a theoretical matter, though, what I said was right: if you buy every combination (meaning that you in fact hold every combination), you have a 100% chance of winning.

sure... I was simply pointing out that the very act of attempting to buy 3.28 million lottery tickets would create an entirely different "odds of winning" scenario than simply "1 in 3.28M"

right..?

[catamount man]

Just ONE REASON why I left the Roman Catholic Church.

[JoltinJoe]

Huh??

As a practical matter, there can be valid reasons to assess error and chaos -- as a theoretical matter, though, what I said was right: if you buy every combination (meaning that you in fact hold every combination), you have a 100% chance of winning.

sure... I was simply pointing out that the very act of attempting to buy 3.28 million lottery tickets would create an entirely different "odds of winning" scenario than simply "1 in 3.28M"

right..?

If you mean that a person who tries to buy all combinations woulld make errors, or the vendor would make errors, which would result in (i) the purchase of a number of duplicate tickets and (ii) the inevitable exclusion of various number combinations that the person intended to purchase, I agree.

If you are saying chaos and exclsuion otherwise impacts on the probability, I'm not sure how or what you mean.

[Pwns]

I thought of another way of expressing this, in a clearer fashion.

Here in New York, there is a lottery game, "Sweet Million," a pick-6 game in which no number can repeat, and in which you select numbers from "1" to "40." The odds of winning the grand prize of $1,000,000 is about 1:3.5 million.

If you were to buy every single combination of those 40 numbers, every ticket you hold would have a 1:3.5 million chance of being a winner; but your overall chance of winning would be a 100% (statistical certainty).

(We will put aside for the moment the fact that you spent $3.5 million to win a $1M).

Um...
based on the information you posted I calculated the odds and 1 in 3.5M is not correct,I get 1 in 3.28M

You are both wrong, it's actually 3.8 million to 1
[(40)(39)(38)(37)(36)(35)]/[(1)(2)(3)(4)(5)(6)] =3,838,380

[Chizzang]

sure... I was simply pointing out that the very act of attempting to buy 3.28 million lottery tickets would create an entirely different "odds of winning" scenario than simply "1 in 3.28M"

right..?

If you mean that a person who tries to buy all combinations woulld make errors, or the vendor would make errors, which would result in (i) the purchase of a number of duplicate tickets and (ii) the inevitable exclusion of various number combinations that the person intended to purchase, I agree.

If you are saying chaos and exclsuion otherwise impacts on the probability, I'm not sure how or what you mean.

Yup...exactly what I mean
The theoretical information always falls down once practical application is applied in projects of this size
trying to buy 3.5 million lottery tickets - each with a different number would be hysterical to try to organize

[Chizzang]

Um...
based on the information you posted I calculated the odds and 1 in 3.5M is not correct,I get 1 in 3.28M

You are both wrong, it's actually 3.8 million to 1
[(40)(39)(38)(37)(36)(35)]/[(1)(2)(3)(4)(5)(6)] =3,838,380

I tried but my calculator on my phone only has 6 place holders so I had to use pencil and paper

[Appaholic]

Joe, what would the percentage have to be for you to consider it safe sex? Would you consider less than 5% infection rate with condoms safe sex? less than 2%?

0% = safe sex.

Something less than 0% is "safer sex," but it is not "safe."

The more times someone engages in "safer sex," the less safe it becomes.

Now consider the consequences of that on a society-wide basis.

Using a condom may be better than not using a condom, but let's not kid ourselves. Engage in risky conduct often enough, the odds decrease against you.

So, is your problem with the semantics ("Safe sex") or with the failure rate?

[JoltinJoe]

0% = safe sex.

Something less than 0% is "safer sex," but it is not "safe."

The more times someone engages in "safer sex," the less safe it becomes.

Now consider the consequences of that on a society-wide basis.

Using a condom may be better than not using a condom, but let's not kid ourselves. Engage in risky conduct often enough, the odds decrease against you.

So, is your problem with the semantics ("Safe sex") or with the failure rate?

What you call semantics I call misleading. People who think condom use is safe, rather than simply safer than unprotected sex, can be inclined to have more sexual encounters and (not to start the discussion about probabilities again) that conduct, multiplied over a society a a whole, could cause more HIV transmissions.

[D1B]

So, is your problem with the semantics ("Safe sex") or with the failure rate?

What you call semantics I call misleading. People who think condom use is safe, rather than simply safer than unprotected sex, can be inclined to have more sexual encounters and (not to start the discussion about probabilities again) that conduct, multiplied over a society a a whole, could cause more HIV transmissions.

Joe, you're not in court, nor are you in catholic fantasy land where the inhabitants are rich, white and happily monogamous. SMFH at counselor Joe.

No one thinks condoms are 100% safe.

Where abstinence is unrealistic, especially in male dominated, poor Africa where a significant % of all men are HIV positive - condoms save lives.

[D1B]

Ummmm, lets see again....the World Health Organization or 80 year old sexually repressed closet homosexual pedophile men who have never had legal sex??? Hmmmm....

Joe, people are laughing at you.

From a World Health Organization Fact Sheet:

pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections
Condoms are the only contraceptive method proven to reduce the risk of all sexually transmitted infections (STIs), including HIV. They can be used as a dual-purpose method, both for prevention of pregnancy and protection against STIs.

Prevention of pregnancy
Estimated pregnancy rates during perfect use of condoms, that is for those who report using the method exactly as it should be used (correctly) and at every act of intercourse (consistently), is 3 percent at 12 months.

The most frequently cited condom effectiveness rate is for typical use, which includes perfect and imperfect use (i.e. not used at every act of intercourse, or used incorrectly). The pregnancy rate during typical use can be much higher (10-14%) than for perfect use, but this is due primarily to inconsistent and incorrect use, not to condom failure. Condom failure – the device breaking or slipping off completely during intercourse – is uncommon.

Disease prevention
Laboratory studies have found that viruses (including HIV) do not pass through intact latex condoms even when devices are stretched or stressed.

In Thailand, the promotion by the government of 100% condom use by commercial sex workers led to a dramatic increase in the use of condoms (from 14% in 1990 to 94% in 1994); an equally dramatic decline in the nation-wide numbers of bacterial STD cases (from 410,406 cases in 1997 to 27,362 cases in 1994); and reduced HIV prevalence in Thai soldiers.

The most convincing data on the effectiveness of condoms in preventing HIV infection has been generated by prospective studies undertaken on serodiscordant couples, when one partner is infected with HIV and the other is not. These studies show that, with consistent condom use, the HIV infection rate among uninfected partners was less than 1 percent per year. Also, in situations where one partner is definitely infected, inconsistent condom use can be as risky as not using condoms at all.

Allergy to latex condoms
Latex allergies are very rare among the general population. While 1-2 billion condoms are used per year in the USA, the FDA only received 44 reports of allergic reactions associated with condom use between October 1988 and end of 1991. The Centres for Disease Control, Atlanta, USA estimate that the population risk of an allergic reaction to latex is 0.08% and the nature of the reaction tends to be very mild. Concerns about latex allergies should not inhibit sexually active people who are at risk of exposure to pregnancy and STIs using condoms, since the risks associated with unprotected sexual contact are far greater than those from exposure to latex.

Joe do you know any of these scholars?

Further reading
Hatcher RA, Trussel J, et al. Contraceptive Technology, 16 (1994) and 17 (in press) Revised Editions. New York: Irvington Publishers Inc.
McNeill ET et al. The Latex Condom, Family Health International, 1998
Dominik R. Male condom evaluation: statistical considerations for equivalence studies and extrapolating breakage and slippage to pregnancy rates. Presented at NIH/FDA Workshop on Contraceptive Efficacy and STD Prevention: Issues in the Design of Clinical Trials. Bethesda, MD, USA, April 6-8, 1994.
Hanenberg RS et al. Impact of Thailand’s HIV-control programme as indicated by the decline of sexually transmitted infections. Lancet 1994;344:243-45
Nelson KE et al. Changes in sexual behaviour and decline in HIV infection among young men in Thailand. New England Journal Medicine 1996;335:297-303
Saracco A et al. Man to woman sexual transmission of HIV: Longitudinal study of 343 steady partners of infected men. Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome 1993;6:497-502
de Vincezi I. A longitudinal study if human immunodeficiency virus transmission by heterosexual partners. New England Journal of Medicine 1994;331:341-46
Deschamps MM et al. Heterosexual transmission of HIV in Haiti. Ann Intern Med 1996;125:324

[JoltinJoe]

What you call semantics I call misleading. People who think condom use is safe, rather than simply safer than unprotected sex, can be inclined to have more sexual encounters and (not to start the discussion about probabilities again) that conduct, multiplied over a society a a whole, could cause more HIV transmissions.

Joe, you're not in court, nor are you in catholic fantasy land where the inhabitants are rich, white and happily monogamous. SMFH at counselor Joe.

No one thinks condoms are 100% safe.

Where abstinence is unrealistic, especially in male dominated, poor Africa where a significant % of all men are HIV positive - condoms save lives.

Again, people no doubt are amused by your inability to grasp a simple point. Condom use is not safe; it is merely safer. No doubt, if someone is going to abandon common sense and engage in risky conduct, he should use a condom. Just don't delude yourself into thinking this conduct is safe.

Condoms don't save lives. They just make it less likely that a life will be lost. Don't you get it?

(And you continue to overlook the regions of Africa where the HIV-rate is slowing most markedly are those areas were Catholicism is growing at the fastest rates. Why is that?).

[D1B]

Joe, you're not in court, nor are you in catholic fantasy land where the inhabitants are rich, white and happily monogamous. SMFH at counselor Joe.

No one thinks condoms are 100% safe.

Where abstinence is unrealistic, especially in male dominated, poor Africa where a significant % of all men are HIV positive - condoms save lives.

Again, people no doubt are amused by your inability to grasp a simple point. Condom use is not safe; it is merely safer. No doubt, if someone is going to abandon common sense and engage in risky conduct, he should use a condom. Just don't delude yourself into thinking this conduct is safe.

Condoms don't save lives. They just make it less likely that a life will be lost. Don't you get it?

(And you continue to overlook the regions of Africa where the HIV-rate is slowing most markedly are those areas were Catholicism is growing at the fastest rates. Why is that?).

Joe, you're a lawyer, right? Use your legal team to find any evidence whatsoever where I say condoms are 100% safe.

Joe, you aint in catholic fantasy land.

You aint in court Joe.

Joe, those areas where AIDS is slowing were some of the worse. While I've seen no credit to catholocism, invarilbly the health orgs keeping the stats cite the fact that the people who contracted AIDS (including children) during its rapid increase are now dead. Hence the decline.

You're an evil fuck taking credit for something your organization exasperated through villification of condoms and blaming the scourge of AIDS initially on homosexuals. Now they're all dead and you claim victory!

Shame on you Joe.

[Cap'n Cat]

Joe, Joe, Joe, Joe, Joe....................

Family planning people and other condom use supporters and users have preached vociferously for decades that the condom in not 100% safe. Come on, Joe.

[D1B]

Joe, Joe, Joe, Joe, Joe....................

Family planning people and other condom use supporters and users have preached vociferously for decades that the condom in not 100% safe. Come on, Joe.

Asshole thinks he's in court or something. Any idiot knows condoms aint 100% and what the fuck is wrong with "safer", unless you're a vatican drone like Joe.

SMFH at Perry Mason.

[JoltinJoe]

Again, people no doubt are amused by your inability to grasp a simple point. Condom use is not safe; it is merely safer. No doubt, if someone is going to abandon common sense and engage in risky conduct, he should use a condom. Just don't delude yourself into thinking this conduct is safe.

Condoms don't save lives. They just make it less likely that a life will be lost. Don't you get it?

(And you continue to overlook the regions of Africa where the HIV-rate is slowing most markedly are those areas were Catholicism is growing at the fastest rates. Why is that?).

Joe, you're a lawyer, right? Use your legal team to find any evidence whatsoever where I say condoms are 100% safe.

Joe, you aint in catholic fantasy land.

You aint in court Joe.

Joe, those areas where AIDS is slowing were some of the worse. While I've seen no credit to catholocism, invarilbly the health orgs keeping the stats cite the fact that the people who contracted AIDS (including children) during its rapid increase are now dead. Hence the decline.

You're an evil **** taking credit for something your organization exasperated through villification of condoms and blaming the scourge of AIDS initially on homosexuals. Now they're all dead and you claim victory!

Shame on you Joe.

Now you're not even making sense.

And you are wrong about why, according to the experts, the AIDS rate started dropping in areas of Africa during the last few years. There are various reasons for the drop, but the primary reason cited is better choices with respect to sexual activity.


http://www.scidev.net/en/news/zimbabwe- ... op-in.html

They say a well-educated population, good risk communication, and a fear of dying of AIDS are likely to have influenced these changes.

Prevalence declined most among young and educated people, including drops of 23 per cent among men aged 17-29 and 49 per cent among women aged 15-24.

The study found evidence that men and women were having their first sexual activity later, and fewer casual relationships.

It adds that there was no evidence for increased condom use with regular partners, but that for men, "consistent condom use in casual partnerships lessened the risk of HIV infection".

Look, most people can control their impulses. I know I'm talking to a guy who can't resist a chili dog that's been sitting for hours on the 7-11 grill at 3 a.m., but really most people can control themselves.

[D1B]

Joe, you're a lawyer, right? Use your legal team to find any evidence whatsoever where I say condoms are 100% safe.

Joe, you aint in catholic fantasy land.

You aint in court Joe.

Joe, those areas where AIDS is slowing were some of the worse. While I've seen no credit to catholocism, invarilbly the health orgs keeping the stats cite the fact that the people who contracted AIDS (including children) during its rapid increase are now dead. Hence the decline.

You're an evil **** taking credit for something your organization exasperated through villification of condoms and blaming the scourge of AIDS initially on homosexuals. Now they're all dead and you claim victory!

Shame on you Joe.

Now you're not even making sense.

Does this help Joe:

Uganda's AIDS Decline Attributed to Deaths

By David Brown
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 24, 2005; Page A02

BOSTON, Feb. 23 -- Abstinence and sexual fidelity have played virtually no role in the much-heralded decline of AIDS rates in the most closely studied region of Uganda, two researchers told a gathering of AIDS scientists here.

It is the deaths of previously infected people, not dramatic change in human behavior, that is the main engine behind the ebbing of the overall rate, or prevalence, of AIDS in southern Uganda over the last decade, they reported.

The findings, not yet published, contradict earlier evidence that attributed Uganda's success in AIDS prevention largely to campaigns promoting abstinence and faithfulness to sex partners. Much of the prevention work in the Bush administration's $15 billion global AIDS plan is built around those two themes, and Uganda is frequently cited as evidence that the strategy works.

If the report here stands up to scrutiny -- and, more important, is borne out by surveys elsewhere in Uganda -- it will deflate one of the few supposed triumphs to come out of AIDS-battered Africa in the last decade. The success of Uganda's ABC strategy -- the letters stand for "abstinence," "be faithful" and "(use) condoms" -- has been widely touted and is on the verge of being exported to neighboring countries with the help of American money.

"There is an urgent need to assess abstinence and monogamy in other parts of Uganda," said Maria J. Wawer, a physician at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health who presented the data at the 12th Conference on Retroviruses, the annual mid-winter AIDS meeting in the United States.

Ironically, she and her colleagues found that the one prevention technique whose use did increase between 1994 and 2003 was condoms -- the part of the ABC triad that has been relatively de-emphasized in the Bush plan.

"Abstinence and monogamy are very good behaviors," she said in a press briefing after her presentation. "On the other hand, the data support that in this setting, the behavior that seems to have been the easiest to increase over time is condom use."

President Bush and administration officials have repeatedly cited Uganda's experience in promoting their approach. "We can learn from the experience of other countries when it comes to a good program to prevent the spread of AIDS, like the nation of Uganda," Bush said last June in Philadelphia, adding that the ABC program is "a practical, balanced and moral message."

Wawer's findings come from a study of 10,000 people ages 15 to 49 who live in 44 villages near Uganda's border with Tanzania. Each year researchers have gone door to door collecting blood and urine samples and asking about health and behavior. About 85 percent of residents cooperate with the study, which over the years has grown to include AIDS treatment and prevention services as well as research.

Today, the Rakai Health Sciences Program -- which is run by Columbia, Johns Hopkins University and several Ugandan organizations -- has about 400 employees. They include physicians, counselors and AIDS prevention educators.

Uganda is one of the 15 "target countries" in the Bush AIDS program, formally known as the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief.

In the Rakai district, the percentage of women infected with HIV fell from 20 percent in 1994 to 13 percent in 2003. For men, the rate of infection declined from 15 percent to 9 percent, a decline of roughly one-third.

Over that same period, however, the fraction of men reporting two or more sexual partners in the previous year rose from 28 percent to 35 percent. The fraction of young men ages 15 to 19 who were not sexually active fell from about 60 percent to just under 50 percent. For women that age, the proportion not having sex remained at about 30 percent through the decade.

The median age of first intercourse for men fell from 17.1 to 16.2 years, and for women from 15.9 to 15.5 years.

Condom use, however, changed markedly over the survey period. In 1994, only about 10 percent of the men said they consistently used condoms with non-marital partners, compared with 50 percent in 2003. For women of the same age, the rate of condom use in non-marital sex increased from 2 percent to 28 percent.

Earlier data indicating that young Ugandans were delaying first intercourse came from surveys of primary school students and national health studies in 1989, 1995 and 2000 that were conducted in different regions each time.

Because the Rakai survey has continued for years in the same place, it also provides an unusually precise measure of the rate of new infections, or incidence.

For women ages 15 to 24, incidence has risen slightly over the last decade, from just below 1.5 new infections per 100 women per year to just above that number. For men, incidence increased from about 0.7 infections to 1 per 100 men per year.

That means Rakai's declining HIV prevalence is not due to a falloff in new infections. Instead it appears to be explained by an increase in deaths. Between the 2002 and 2003 surveys, 125 people became newly infected, and 200 people with long-standing infections died.

"Death alone accounted for a 0.6-percent-point reduction in HIV prevalence that year," Wawer said.

Among her more troubling findings was that the percentage of men who had become infected in the previous year and also reported having two or more partners that year rose from about 48 percent to 68 percent. Newly infected people have unusually large amounts of AIDS virus in their blood and by some estimates are up to 10 times more likely to infect someone during intercourse.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/ar ... Feb23.html

[D1B]

Joe, you're a lawyer, right? Use your legal team to find any evidence whatsoever where I say condoms are 100% safe.

Joe, you aint in catholic fantasy land.

You aint in court Joe.

Joe, those areas where AIDS is slowing were some of the worse. While I've seen no credit to catholocism, invarilbly the health orgs keeping the stats cite the fact that the people who contracted AIDS (including children) during its rapid increase are now dead. Hence the decline.

You're an evil **** taking credit for something your organization exasperated through villification of condoms and blaming the scourge of AIDS initially on homosexuals. Now they're all dead and you claim victory!

Shame on you Joe.

Now you're not even making sense.

And you are wrong about why, according to the experts, the AIDS rate started dropping in areas of Africa during the last few years. There are various reasons for the drop, but the primary reason cited is better choices with respect to sexual activity.


http://www.scidev.net/en/news/zimbabwe- ... op-in.html

They say a well-educated population, good risk communication, and a fear of dying of AIDS are likely to have influenced these changes.

Prevalence declined most among young and educated people, including drops of 23 per cent among men aged 17-29 and 49 per cent among women aged 15-24.

The study found evidence that men and women were having their first sexual activity later, and fewer casual relationships.

It adds that there was no evidence for increased condom use with regular partners, but that for men, "consistent condom use in casual partnerships lessened the risk of HIV infection".

Look, most people can control their impulses. I know I'm talking to a guy who can't resist a chili dog that's been sitting for hours on the 7-11 grill at 3 a.m., but really most people can control themselves.

Chili Dog - damn straigh - good one

Joe, abstinence is fine, monogamy is a goal. Africa, a heavily male dominated culture where women are essentially powerless, must go through a massive behavioral shift, that without industry and technology, is gonna take generations to complete. Until then, condoms are lifesavers and help control the spread of HIV - a fact noted by practically every reputable health organization in the world.

[D1B]

Joe, you're a lawyer, right? Use your legal team to find any evidence whatsoever where I say condoms are 100% safe.

Joe, you aint in catholic fantasy land.

You aint in court Joe.

Joe, those areas where AIDS is slowing were some of the worse. While I've seen no credit to catholocism, invarilbly the health orgs keeping the stats cite the fact that the people who contracted AIDS (including children) during its rapid increase are now dead. Hence the decline.

You're an evil **** taking credit for something your organization exasperated through villification of condoms and blaming the scourge of AIDS initially on homosexuals. Now they're all dead and you claim victory!

Shame on you Joe.

Now you're not even making sense.

And you are wrong about why, according to the experts, the AIDS rate started dropping in areas of Africa during the last few years. There are various reasons for the drop, but the primary reason cited is better choices with respect to sexual activity.


http://www.scidev.net/en/news/zimbabwe- ... op-in.html

They say a well-educated population, good risk communication, and a fear of dying of AIDS are likely to have influenced these changes.

Prevalence declined most among young and educated people, including drops of 23 per cent among men aged 17-29 and 49 per cent among women aged 15-24.

The study found evidence that men and women were having their first sexual activity later, and fewer casual relationships.

It adds that there was no evidence for increased condom use with regular partners, but that for men, "consistent condom use in casual partnerships lessened the risk of HIV infection".

Look, most people can control their impulses. I know I'm talking to a guy who can't resist a chili dog that's been sitting for hours on the 7-11 grill at 3 a.m., but really most people can control themselves.

Joe, from your source. I took the extra effort to locate the complete article in Science and it clearly supports my position:

Data on high-risk sexual behavior can be underreported (21), a tendency that may increase over time in an HIV epidemic. Caution is therefore needed in interpreting these results (11). Furthermore, when considering the impact of changes in sexual behavior on an HIV epidemic at the population level, it is important to recognize the contribution of selective AIDS-induced mortality (22). Death rates are particularly high in individuals with high numbers of lifetime sexual partners, and their death decreases the variance in reported numbers of sexual partners. This in turn, alters the sexual network through which HIV infection spreads within the population (23), for example, by forcing young women disposed toward forming relationships with older men to choose younger partners or abstain. In the current study, the individuals who died during the intersurvey period had reported higher numbers of lifetime sexual partners at baseline than those who survived to be reinterviewed (men: mean, 13.6 versus 8.7, P = 0.001; women: mean, 3.0 versus 2.0, P < 0.001). Given the relatively small numbers of individuals who died, AIDS-associated mortality explained only 6.3% of the observed reduction in sexual partner change in men and 8.6% in women, but it cannot be discounted as an important long-term factor.

HIV prevalence in eastern Zimbabwe is similar to national estimates (25), and the decline occurred equally in areas with and without focused interventions (table S3). Furthermore, the trends in HIV prevalence in women attending antenatal clinics in our study areas mirror those seen nationally in recent surveillance data (11). Thus, these data support the interpretation that HIV prevalence in the general population in Zimbabwe has begun to decline.

Owing to the long average incubation period of HIV infection, HIV prevalence reflects the accumulation of infections over a period of more than 10 years and is insensitive to behavior change. A change in behavior can precede any observed decline in HIV prevalence and would explain the absence of concurrent reductions in HIV incidence in Uganda when HIV prevalence fell during the late 1990s (9). Indeed, behavior change may have been most rapid in Uganda in the early 1990s when HIV prevalence first began to decline (3). If so, Uganda could provide a model for the pattern of change now seen in Zimbabwe. Our data suggest that the changes in behavior occurring in Zimbabwe are similar to those underpinning the long-term decline in HIV prevalence in Uganda, i.e., a delay in age at first sex and a reduction in casual sex (5), but that consistent condom use with casual partners has also contributed.

Given the stage of the HIV epidemic (26), fear of AIDS mortality may have influenced behavior (22). Zimbabwe's well-educated population (27) and good communications and health service infrastructure could have facilitated HIV prevention (13). HIV prevention activities in Zimbabwe (28) have included early control of sexually transmitted infections, social marketing of condoms, voluntary counseling and testing services (26), television and radio serial dramas, and the activities of the Zimbabwe National AIDS Trust Fund (29).