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Western health officials have often accused the Catholic church of encouraging the spread of AIDS by objecting to the use of condoms. The church maintains that government distribution of condoms promotes sexual promiscuity and that abstinence and fidelity are the only effective ways to inhibit AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases.
Recent medical scientific studies support the church's view that the prevalence of AIDS cannot be reduced unless individuals change their behaviour. A 2006 article published in the British Medical Journal suggested that the protection afforded by condoms may encourage riskier behaviour, thus largely offsetting the usefulness of condoms.
Consistent use of condoms has been shown to reduce the efficiency of transmission of HIV and various other sexually transmitted infections, but the perception that using condoms can reduce the risk of HIV infection may have contributed to increases in inconsistent use, which has minimal protective effect, as well as to a possible neglect of the risks of having multiple sexual partners. Thus, the protective effect of promoting condoms may be attenuated at the population level and could even be offset by aggregate increases in risky sexual behaviour. [footnotes omitted]
Another study published last year in Science magazine found that reduction in the prevalence of AIDS in Zimbabwe was associated with changes in sexual behaviour.
An article in the February 2007 issue of the Journal of Youth and Adolescence supports the view that delaying sexual activity reduces the risk of later delinquent behaviour.
The article, "Adolescent Sexual Debut and Later Delinquency," by Stacy Armour and Dana Haynie, observed that the question of ill effects resulting from sex outside marriage is a controversial point in the debate over whether to promote abstinence. Up until now, however, there has been little research on the topic.
Armour and Haynie used data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Adolescent Health to examine interconnections between the age of sexual debut and subsequent delinquency problems. The study covered some 12,000 students and the findings were controlled for variables such as age, race and family structure.
Among the conclusions from the study was the finding that premature initiation of sexual activity increases the risks of delinquency. Similarly, delaying sexual activity later than one's peers "offers a protective effect and reduces the risks of engaging in subsequent delinquency." The corresponding negative and positive effects go beyond adolescence and persist until early adulthood.
The specific delinquent behaviours considered were: vandalism and property damage, theft, and drug trafficking.
The abstract of the latter article is posted here; the full text can be viewed here (html) or here (pdf).
These studies provide solid support for the church's contention that the root problem of the AIDS pandemic is not medical or technical, but moral. Sexually transmitted diseases are best combated, not by handing out condoms, but by instilling the virtues of abstinence in singleness and fidelity in marriage.
h/t: Big News Network.com - Breaking Religious News
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