Vatican meeting on preventing and treating HIV/Aids

AIDS experts from around the world have gathered in Rome for a two-day conference on preventing the spread of HIV and caring for people with AIDS. The meeting was organized by the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers, and will look at the role the Church plays in treating the disease. One topic being discussed is the role of condoms in the prevention of the disease.

“Condoms have not proven to have worked particularly well in Africa, in terms of population,” says Dr. Edward Green, the former director of the AIDS prevention research project at Harvard University.

“There are a number of reasons – they are not used correctly, people do not use them consistently, particularly with partners that they have been with for a while. Condoms are typically used with casual and commercial partners,” he told Vatican Radio.

“We now know that having multiple concurrent sexual partners is what drives the so-called hyper-epidemics in Southern and Eastern Africa, so discouraging multiple concurrent partners is the single most important intervention or behaviour change which will bring down HIV rates,” Dr. Green said. “It is happening in Africa, HIV rates are going down in Africa, and yet there hasn’t been widespread promotion of discouraging multiple concurrent partners, or we might say promotion of fidelity or monogamy…yet people are doing it. I think out of common sense, and because of the influence of the Church.”

Listen to the full interview by Suzy Hodges with Dr. Edward Green: