Prevention of AIDS in Moscow
Holier than the PopeMikhail Alekseev, Medical Portal
The developers of the document, headed by the chairman of the commission Lyudmila Stebenkova, intend to fight the spread of HIV infection through the promotion of abstinence and marital fidelity. The city will not support programs to reduce the harm from drug use and spread knowledge about condoms. The bill provides for the introduction of interdisciplinary HIV prevention lessons in schools, a significant part of which will be devoted to familiarizing children with Russian culture, religion and family values.
Schoolchildren will also be told about the usefulness of sports and the harm of casual sexual relations. According to Ms. Stebenkova, this "will make it possible to inform schoolchildren and students on an ongoing basis about the ways of HIV transmission, as well as to set up children for monogamous relationships."
Another provision of the document is the non–participation of the city authorities in supporting "harm reduction" programs - the free exchange of disposable syringes for injecting drug users. Information materials released at the expense of the city budget will not include information "misleading the audience about the guarantee of protection against HIV infection when using mechanical contraceptives," that is, condoms.
As L. Stebenkova rightly noted, the document prepared for discussion in the Moscow City Duma is intended to legislate the events that have been held in Moscow over the past years. In fact, the attitude of the Moscow authorities to the promotion of safe sex is known, and is regularly confirmed by officials at all levels. It remains only to recall how the issues of HIV prevention/Problems are solved abroad and whose experience the metropolitan deputies are guided by.
Crafty numbersThe authors of the bill propose not to resort to "harm reduction" programs, pointing to the fact that the regions of Russia in which these programs have ever been used are 2-3 times ahead of other regions in terms of the spread of HIV infection.
There is no doubt that this is the case, but it is worth considering whether Moscow legislators are confusing the cause with the consequence.
According to the representative of the Russian branch of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) by Anna Chernyakhovskaya, harm reduction programs have been implemented in recent years in St. Petersburg, Irkutsk, Voronezh and a number of other cities of the Russian Federation. At the same time, the regions with the most unfavorable HIV situation were initially selected for the implementation of the programs/AIDS.
Similar programs have been operating for a long time in France, Italy, Spain and the UK. The data collected in these countries indicate that with their help, the rate of spread of HIV infection in risk groups can be reduced by 33-43 percent. Countries such as Indonesia and China, where the number of injecting drug users is rapidly increasing, although it remains incomparable with Russian indicators, have recently begun to actively implement harm reduction programs on their territory.
However, as in the whole world, injecting drug use is gradually ceasing to be the main way of spreading HIV infection in Russia. In 2008, 65 per cent of new HIV infections were attributed to this route of transmission. In Moscow, however, infection with traditional sex provided more than 60 percent of the total number of new cases of HIV infection already in 2005. In this regard, it is necessary to return to another point of the Moscow bill – namely, exotic, to date, methods of preventing risky sexual behavior of young people.
Overseas experienceNo one has ever seriously doubted that the observance of marital fidelity and the rejection of promiscuous sexual contacts can only contribute to reducing the incidence of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections.
Another question is whether there are measures that can increase the number of faithful spouses and chaste boys and girls.
The first experiments in this regard were conducted in the USA – since 1996, federal funding for educational programs to promote chastity among American schoolchildren has begun in this country. Educational programs aimed at preventing sexual infections and early pregnancies among adolescents through the dissemination of knowledge about the grave consequences of early sexual activity, as well as about the benefits of monogamous relationships and abstinence from intimate life before marriage were eligible for State funding. At the same time, schoolchildren were not told about the rules of safe sex, and, on the contrary, they focused their attention on the fact that there are no means that give an absolute guarantee against unwanted pregnancy or infections.
Initially, all American states joined the program with the exception of liberal California. However, after the appearance of the first studies that showed that chastity-trained schoolchildren begin sexual life no later than their peers, have on average the same number of sexual partners, but at the same time they are much worse versed in contraceptives and ways of transmission of sexual infections, interest in such experiments in the United States has declined. The case was not helped by the efforts of the George Bush administration, which allowed non-governmental, mainly religious, organizations to implement programs, and also, contrary to the protests of international charitable organizations and scientists, legislated a significant part of the funds allocated to fight the AIDS epidemic in the world, to promote chastity and abstinence in Africa.
Currently, abstinence programs continue to be supported by 25 American states, but their funding is steadily declining. Mixed programs are highly trusted in the United States, which emphasize the positive role of abstinence in the sexual sphere, but pay attention to both contraception and safe sex.
However, the Moscow authorities, who a few years ago adopted the tactics of the American sexual counterrevolution, do not intend to stop yet. And, judging by the available information, the most radical version of the American program, which has generally shown its ineffectiveness, is chosen as a model – abstinence minus contraception.
It is also worth adding that the starting conditions for such undertakings in Russia are much worse than in the USA. The preaching of chastity and abstinence has a great chance of success among religious listeners. However, in terms of religiosity, the United States is approaching the countries of Latin America, while the situation in Russia is much closer to the religiously indifferent Western Europe. And if we take into account the traditionally low level of students' trust in teachers in Russian schools, then we can assume that the "monogamy lessons" planned by the Moscow authorities will rather lead not to the desired, but to the diametrically opposite effect. And this, with the growing role of the heterosexual route of HIV transmission, the rejection of harm reduction programs and the ongoing war on condoms and safe sex, can lead to disastrous consequences.
Do like DadThe discussion of the Moscow bill coincided with the scandal surrounding Pope Benedict XVI, who unexpectedly stated during a visit to Africa that the distribution of condoms would not only not solve the AIDS problem on the continent, but also worsen the situation.
The inadequacy of this statement was so obvious that the pontiff's words were censored by the Vatican press service itself. The truth could not be hidden, and the public around the world was once again shocked by the obscurantism of the church. Well, in Moscow, the pope has supporters who have no desire to hide their beliefs.
Portal "Eternal youth" www.vechnayamolodost.ru01.04.2009