The War on Choice by Gloria Feldt

Author:Gloria Feldt
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Nonfiction
ISBN: 9780307418616
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2007-12-18T00:00:00+00:00

The last time this country saw such rigid ideology in direct opposition to a proven public health approach was nearly a hundred years ago, when the American Social Hygiene Association fought hard to prohibit condom use. “Social hygienists” believed that anyone who risked getting venereal diseases should suffer the consequences. It’s no wonder that by the end of World War I, American troops had very high rates of sexually transmitted infections, while our British allies, who had condoms, did not. The Secretary of the Navy at the time believed that condoms and other prophylactics “were not Christian.” But when he was out of the office, his more astute assistant, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, ordered that prophylactic kits be distributed to sailors. By World War II, military leaders were more realistic, promoting the use of condoms with training films that urged soldiers, “Don’t forget—put it on before you put it in.” Today, General Colin Powell has made his views about the importance of condom use clear, despite administration policy to the contrary.

Condoms save lives, which became clearer than ever when AIDS hit the United States in the 1980s, and public health officials promoted condom use to stem the epidemic. Used correctly, condoms are 99 percent effective against HIV/AIDS. In a 1991 study of couples in which one partner had HIV, all 123 couples that used condoms every time for four years prevented transmission of the virus. In 122 couples that did not use condoms every time, 12 partners became infected. In the U.S., nearly 800,000 cases of AIDS have been reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and there are nearly 40,000 new cases in the U.S. per year. Many such cases could have been prevented by condoms.

It’s almost unfathomable that the government of the United States of America is discouraging condom use at a time when we are still seeing so many new cases of AIDS, but that is indeed the goal of the ideological right. In fact, the administration has gone so far as to censor health information on a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Web site. Under threat of losing funds, the CDC was forced to remove a Web site fact sheet that described accurate condom use and discussed the effectiveness of condoms in preventing HIV/AIDS transmission. Our public health information is becoming infected with policies that are threatening the health of our citizens, young and old.

The CDC is the leading federal agency charged with protecting the health and safety of Americans, and “providing credible information to enhance health decisions”; it is responsible for developing and applying disease prevention and control, and health promotion and education. Given the CDC’s key role in public health, it is nothing short of astonishing that the administration would try to exercise censorship over a CDC informational Web site. It is even more astonishing that CDC officials acquiesced. The original comprehensive fact sheet about condoms, which made reference to research showing that educating people about condom use does not promote

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