The Aids debate

Amidst the current economic turbulence, climate change, energy concerns, rising nationalism throughout the world and depleting resources, the AIDs debate is seen as something of a distraction.

Yet the Pope’s remarks today that it is ‘a tragedy that cannot be overcome………through the distribution of condoms’ highlights that we need to have this debate. The Pope is right that condoms do not and cannot always pre-empt AIDs contraction. But at present they provide the best way of trying to pre-empt this crippling disease.

For this reason the people of Africa, who find themselves in the AIDs hotspot of the world, must not listen to those such as the former South African President, Thabo Mbeki or the Pope. For if they do they are effectively signing their own death warrants.