Source:  The Guardian

“So here we are again, talking past one another on the subject of condoms, Aids and Africa. Tanya Gold says the pope’s got it all wrong. Giuseppe Caramazza defends the pontiff, under the headline “the condom is no cure for Aids in Africa”.

Let’s get some facts straight. Condoms prevent HIV. And if we prevent HIV, then we prevent Aids, without having to put millions into the bank accounts of pharmaceutical companies. Caramazza toes the papal line, implying that African countries with higher rates of condom use have higher rates of HIV, and that condoms therefore don’t work in preventing HIV. Well, more people use insecticide-treated bed nets in west Africa than they do in Britain, and west Africa has far higher rates of malaria. Proof, by Caramazza’s logic, that treated bed nets don’t work as protection against malaria.”

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Source:  New York Times

“President Obama on Friday announced the end of a 22-year ban on travel to the United States by people who had tested positive for the virus that causes AIDS, fulfilling a promise he made to gay advocates and acting to eliminate a restriction he said was “rooted in fear rather than fact.”

At a White House ceremony, Mr. Obama announced that a rule canceling the ban would be published on Monday and would take effect after a routine 60-day waiting period. The president had promised to end the ban before the end of the year.

“If we want to be a global leader in combating H.I.V./AIDS, we need to act like it,” Mr. Obama said. “Now, we talk about reducing the stigma of this disease, yet we’ve treated a visitor living with it as a threat.”

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Click here to read the full transcript of President Obama’s remarks.

Source: New York Times

“WASHINGTON — Federal health officials are preparing a plan to study a bold new strategy to stop the spread of the AIDS virus: routinely testing virtually every adult in a community, and promptly treating those found to be infected.

The strategy is called “test and treat,” and officials say the two sites for the three-year study will be the District of Columbia and the Bronx — locales with some of the nation’s highest rates of infection with human immunodeficiency virus.

The officials emphasize that this is just a first step. The goal is not to measure whether “test and treat” actually works to slow an epidemic, but whether such a strategy can even be carried out, given the many barriers to being tested and getting medical care.”

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