In an article posted on LifeLube, Charles Stephens wonders what oral prevention and rectal microbicides, amongst others, might mean for HIV prevention and pleasure, risk and taboo.
As “condom-centric” prevention interventions are failing (the intervention, not the condom), hope and expectations are high that other prevention strategies such as PrEP and microbicides could succeed where condoms are failing. However, discussion and debate are rife around these interventions and they are important because we need to think ahead about how they will affect our sexual behaviour.
The problem is “how” to think these …

“Women now account for half of the 33 million people living with HIV around the world. In sub-Saharan Africa, home to two-thirds of the world’s people living with HIV, women are even harder hit, making up 60 percent of those infected. Not only are women biologically more susceptible than men to HIV, many behavioral and social factors play into women’s vulnerability.
If a young woman is uninfected with HIV at the time of her marriage, traditional wisdom says that she has avoided the disease altogether. More and more, however, research shows …

Documentary film maker Tim Samuels investigates the globalization of pornography and its connection to health issues in developing countries.
“In Ghana you see the most extraordinary impact of the mainstream western pornography which is predominantly made in Los Angeles and is predominantly condom free. That pornography somehow makes its way to even the most remote and obscure parts of Ghana in Africa.
There are villages which don’t even have electricity; where people live in mud huts; where generators get wheeled into the village and mud huts get turned into impromptu pornographic cinemas. …

Another must see talk from the TED conference. The message to take home is that no simplification can be made neither is it valuable to try to make one.
“We hope that when we act on global problems in the future, we will not only have the heart, we will not only have the money, but we will also use the brain”
Hans Rosling
Professor of global health at Sweden’s Karolinska Institute

The interactive animation in this video is accessible on the Gapminder website.

Rating 3.00 out of 5

Riding bareback:
personal choice vs. social responsability?

The recent decision by the IML’s (International Mr. Leather) executive committee to ban retailers at the group’s annual convention from displaying or selling any pornographic photos and videos which portray or promote unprotected sex, also known as barebacking, triggered a heated debate in the gay and HIV blogosphere. The most quoted response came from Tony Valenzuela who in part elevated the debate above that of accusation of fascism and censorship writing:
“Maybe the better question isn’t whether or not IML’s new policy is censorship – it …