It's difficult to see how 20-cent condoms will help.

Twenty-five percent of the increase is occurring among French gay men -- who can certainly afford condoms.

(Much of the rest of the increase, by the way, is among immigrants from sub-Saharan Africa -- in other words, people who got infected in Africa BEFORE they emigrated to France.

If you factor those people out, gay men account for a far larger share of the new cases -- and that's true in many places in Europe.)

In the US and in the gay male community in particular, condoms have been given away -- for free -- for YEARS.

And HIV prevalence keeps rising.

Why?

The French health service has "warned of a recent rise in high-risk behaviour among the gay population."

That's the problem.

High-risk behavior aka anal penetration.

Anal penetration is the problem.

Not an absence of condoms, which are readily available in the aggressively secular French republic.

But I guess subsidizing condom sales is the French government's way of pretending that it's doing something about HIV.

It's not.

The Dutch demonstrated almost 20 years ago that the way to stop AIDS was to move men AWAY from anal.

Maybe the French should have been paying attention.

Next up:

HIV infection rate rises to epidemic levels in gay community

November 26, 2006

SYDNEY'S gay community has an infection rate of HIV that is similar to that of countries in Africa.

As organisations prepare to mark the 25th anniversary of recognising human immunodeficiency virus, they warned that infection rates were on a steady increase in Australia.

Garrett Prestage, a lecturer at the National Centre in HIV Epidemiology and Clinical Research, said that, in the inner-city area, 10 to 18 per cent of the gay population was HIV infected.

In Lesotho in Africa, the rate was 20 per cent last year, UN figures show.

Last year in NSW [New South Wales], 954 people were diagnosed with HIV and nearly three-quarters of them caught the disease through homosexual contact. By comparison only 109 people in NSW were reported to have had the mumps last year.

"For gay men, HIV is a massive epidemic," Dr Prestage said. "If you are a gay man living in central Sydney, you are living with rates of HIV that are equivalent to sub-Saharan Africa."

Rob Sutherland, 26, who at 19 was infected during his first sexual encounter with a man, said he did not know whether or not he was living with a fatal disease because treatments had advanced so much.

So uncertain is the prognosis for the disease that some experts call it a chronic, manageable illness.

"They don't know how long people are living. They are just living and living," Mr Sutherland said.

This year nearly 3 million people have died of AIDS, the largest annual figure yet.

UN figures show that southern Africa is the centre of the HIV epidemic; 32 per cent of people with HIV globally live in the region and 34 per cent of AIDS deaths globally occur there.

Meanwhile, the AIDS Council of NSW, the Bobby Goldsmith Foundation and People Living with HIV/AIDS will hold their first Walk for AIDS event in Sydney's Royal Botanic Gardens at 10am today.

[emphases mine]

Bill Weintraub:

This is yet another remarkably clueless mainstream media report.

You have to wonder if anyone is editing these things or otherwise reading them before they're published.

Or even after they're published.

Let's start with the headline:

"HIV infection rate rises to epidemic levels in gay community"

No kidding.

HIV infection has been at epidemic levels in gay male communities worldwide since the early 1980s.

That's why they call it an -- epidemic.

Rather, than, say, a tartuffle or a folderol or even an outbreak.

This is not an outbreak.

It's an epidemic, and has been for 25 years.

"As organisations prepare to mark the 25th anniversary of recognising human immunodeficiency virus,"

Actually no, this isn't the 25th anniversary of recognizing the human immunodeficiency virus aka HIV, because HIV wasn't identified until 1984.

December 1, as it happens, isn't the anniversary of anything.

It's just a day which that vast bureaucracy known as UNAIDS chose to be World AIDS Day.

And who knows why?

No doubt it was done by a committee in consultation with a corporation in consultation with a focus group.

Which is why, in terms of history, it has no meaning whatsoever.

What happened 25 years ago, not in December but in June, were the first reports of a strange new disease affecting clusters of gay men on the east and west coast of America.

"they warned that infection rates were on a steady increase in Australia."

Yes, but we've known that for a long time.

See, for example, the thread titled 200 men seeded and pozzed: a barebacker's rampage, which references these increases in Australia.

The news story then tells us that 10 to 18% of the gay men in Sydney are infected, and compares that to a rate of 20% in Lesotho, a district in South Africa.

Says an intrepid researcher:

"For gay men, HIV is a massive epidemic," Dr Prestage said. "If you are a gay man living in central Sydney, you are living with rates of HIV that are equivalent to sub-Saharan Africa."

No kidding.

I have to wonder if Dr Prestage has been reading my work, since this is a point I've made over and over again.

And, in fact, and as I've said, HIV prevalence among gay males is much higher than in sub-Saharan Africa.

Overall, HIV prevalence in sub-Saharan Africa is at 7.4%.

Among gay men in America, by contrast, it's at 25%.

Among Black gay men, 46%.

So it's actually misleading to compare gay Sydney to Lesotho.

If you compare gay Sydney to Africa as a whole -- the degree of infection in Sydney is far higher.

Then we meet "Rob Sutherland, 26, who at 19 was infected during his first sexual encounter with a man."

Uh-huh.

But how was he infected?

By being penetrated anally.

Wouldn't it make more sense to say that?

Then we meet "Rob Sutherland, 26, who at 19 was infected by being penetrated anally by another man."

How bout it?

How bout if in each news report we tell people what actually happened to guys like Rob Sutherland so that people are clear about what actually transmits the virus.

I guess that's not going to happen today.

But you know, guys, it would happen if we started talking about it very loudly -- in the press.

But in order for that to happen, you'd have to donate.

And that you're not doing.

Instead, we're left with this:

Meanwhile, the AIDS Council of NSW, the Bobby Goldsmith Foundation and People Living with HIV/AIDS will hold their first Walk for AIDS event in Sydney's Royal Botanic Gardens at 10am today.

What will a "Walk for AIDS event" achieve?

Nothing.

Telling guys not to do anal -- that would achieve something.

Going for a walk will not.

What "Walk for AIDS" events guarantee is that we'll be observing World AIDS Day -- in 2007.

Bill Weintraub

© All material Copyright 2006 by Bill Weintraub. All rights reserved.