February 18, 2005

Jimmy Hats vs. the Clap On Wednesday's Lou Dobbs Tonight, Florida Rep. David Weldon (R) claimed that condoms "can only protect a man about 30 percent of the time and a woman about 60 percent of the time from contracting gonorrhea." Is that true? The studies I found are epidemiological, not clinical, and don't provide any hard numbers. I'd love to call his office and yell at them, but I want to go in well-armed.
posted by jimbecile 19 years ago
  • Found this little bit on Webmd.com: "When used correctly and consistently, male latex condoms will prevent transmission of gonorrhea and partially protect against chlamydia infection." ~ Denise Mann Here's another quote from that article: "Although not a sure thing, "the clearest way to prevent PID is to prevent [sexually transmitted diseases], particularly gonorrhea, and the way that one would do that would be to use condoms consistently," James Trussel, PhD, tells WebMD. Trussel... is a professor of economics and public affairs and a faculty associate at the Office of Population Research at Princeton University." What this sounds like is him taking a statistic from somewhere & spinning it so it sounds like condoms on a whole are ineffective. What I learned from that Webmd article is that if condoms are used incorrectly or inconsistantly, the chances of catching an STD rise, so the key is to always use them, and always use them correctly.
  • This sounds like a good way to promote the general welfare.
  • Tell him his taxes pay for this. He can stop paying taxes (and go to jail), or learn pertinent statistics. (That CDC link can get you almost anything - this is a gateway.)
  • In general, I find it a sensible course of action to not believe anything a politician says, regardless of what side of the aisle they say it from. That goes double for subject matter that resides south of one's belt buckle.
  • Hell, I'd be happy if the government operated at those levels of efficiency. Let's strike a deal. We'll work at educating the public about using condoms correctly, so their effectiveness rate goes up, if you work on bringing government bogusness down to, and efficiency up to, 30%.
  • f8x -- your "we" controls the entire government. I don't see anyone stopping them from not, say, running up record deficits.
  • *groans*
  • How's about not restricting what government-funded reseachers can say for a start? This is maddening, the very last thing we need right now is to discourage people from using condoms. Honest discourse is desired, rather than solely playing up the potential for condoms to fail. I don't know the transmission rate for the clap, but to give you an idea, if you have unprotected sex with an HIV+ person, your chance of infection is 1/100. It is 1/3 for hepatitis B. This is without a condom and no genital lesions from other stds.
  • genital legions...
  • Oops, I think I got my HIV transmission rate wrong. It might be 1/1000. That guy's numbers are fishy and I highly doubt they were based on anything relating to the general population. Perhaps the rates were based on studies of high risk populations, like people attending STD clinics. There are plenty of stds that condoms will not neccessarily prevent the transmission of--herpes to name a big one. To me this does not suggest the abandonment of condoms, as they still reduce the risk. This just means people need to communicate effectively with potential partners.
  • The best commercial ever for this kind of thing was one that showed two people going at it, and then had everyone they'd been with come in naked, followed by everyone the first everyone had been with etc. etc. After thirty seconds it was just a massive crowd of naked people. Voice Over of Doom: Every person they've ever slept with is touching your personal region if you aren't wearing a condom. It was on Comedy Central back when all they had was Kids in the Hall. Only ever saw it the once. Probably too much flesh for us USians.
  • The source of this "30% failure rate" canard is federally funded abstinence educational materials. It's the government line for the religious audience. Here's a short blurb: http://politics.abovetopsecret.com/thread103441/pg1 The original "why now" curriculum is hard to find on the web.
  • I think these were sexually transmitted statistics. Which is to say, he pulled them out of his ass.
  • *applause for musingmelpomene*
  • Condoms are the gold standard in my biz - and we cannot make a living should we catch something. I have yet to hear of any confirmed instance of an escort in my part of the country and at the same safety level catching anything. I know you'll be thinking, "Yeah, like they'd tell anybody"; but in a business as competitive as this one, and one with numerous boards where clients share info, if one of us had something and passed it along, believe me it would appear on the boards. A much bigger problem is idiot bitches starting rumours that a competitor has got something to screw over her business.
  • *applause for musingmelpomene* Not so fast, Alnedra. You've already been told that ass sex ain't real sex.
  • That's what my wife keeps telling me. I keep telling her to just lie there and stop squirming.
  • Oh. Ok. Then, how about "he pissed them out"? Doesn't have quite the same ring to it, though.
  • musingmelpomene: BWAHAHAHAHAAAHAHAHAHAHAAA!!!!!!!!!!! (thanks, I needed that) mct: You are b-a-d bad.
  • I'm stealing that, Alnedra.