AIDS Conferees Jeer Mention of Abstinence as Preventive Measure
by Bill Fancher, Fred Jackson, and Jody Brown
August 16, 2006
(AgapePress) - - Pro-family advocates say the International AIDS Conference taking place in Toronto this week is a huge waste of time and money -- as well as an opportunity for those in attendance to take a swipe at sexual abstinence as a way to combat the deadly disease.
The opening remarks at the 16th International AIDS Conference were delivered by software guru and multi-millionaire Bill Gates. Family Research Council president Tony Perkins says Gates' comments were well received -- until he brought up the subject of sexual abstinence and fidelity in marriage, which he suggested as possible strategies in combating AIDS. According to Perkins, the hall "erupted" in loud boos.
"Their reaction is very instructive," comments Perkins. "We see here the open hostility of the international AIDS 'community' to anything but the promotion of condoms as a means of combating the spread of AIDS."
Gates wasn't the only Bill to take the conference podium in Canada. Former President Bill Clinton also spoke, praising the White House's "ABC" approach (Abstinence, Be faithful, Condoms) to battle AIDS in Africa -- but blasting the Bush administration's support of abstinence-only education programs in the U.S. Clinton also said he supports government-funded needle-exchange programs as a way to reduce transmission of the AIDS virus.
According to a story in the Globe and Mail newspaper, the former president believes a combination of science, social change, and political will is what is need to "break the back of AIDS."
Illogical Approach
Dr. Paul Cameron of the Family Research Institute says this AIDS conference will go the same route as those in the past, totally ignoring the preventive aspect of AIDS. "You never hear calls for prevention," Cameron observes. "You hear calls for preventive medicine, maybe a vaccine, so that homosexuals can still do sex."
He points out that billions of American dollars are spent trying to convince smokers to quit smoking -- yet homosexuals are told researchers will do all they can to stem the spread of AIDS so that they can continue to have sex, the number-one cause of AIDS. Cameron feels there is no logic to such an approach.
Dr. Cameron has attended the International AIDS Conference before, but has been denied a booth to promote abstinence of homosexual sex as a preventive measure.
