"Many of the men I speak with think circumcision is like an AIDS vaccine. It's not. It's a useful tool to reduce chances of infection at a time and place where few other tools are available, but you can still contract HIV and pass it onto a partner," said a Zambian doctor who treats HIV/AIDS patients at government hospitals, and who declined to be named.
He believes it's like a vaccine because that is what Halperin, Bailey and others have been saying for two years [abstract]. Amazing. A man takes the message and believes it, and suddenly he's at fault for it? Amazing, indeed.
As amazing is a Zambian doctor who is so clueless as to state there are "few other tools ... available." Africa continues to demonstrate that it is a special case. Collectively, it is not capable of containing this virus the way other poor nations have (such as Cambodia, Thailand, and Latin America). It's both an argument for circumcision and an argument that circumcision will not matter and could exacerbate the problem. It is a case where importing a cultural practice that correlates with lower rates in another setting will have little impact.
"The problem is not with the procedure, but the way it is abused by men, so that men think they are now immune from HIV contagion," said Siphiwe Hlope, an HIV-positive woman and founder of the support group, Swazis for Positive Living (SWAPO).
Well, yes the problem is with the procedure. It doesn't protect. How often does one get to witness a myth being birthed? We've seen it. HIV is a very tricky virus. So small, so deadly, so powerful to manipulate powerless men and to give the powerful another tool of manipulation.
