This is interesting. Consider the following scenario. A person gets a cold sore on his lip and goes to the movies. He blows his nose and then washes his hands in a public bathroom where he touches the faucet before and after washing his hands. He transfers the virus to the faucet which is then used by a revivalist fundamentalist minister who is in the habit of washing his hands before he urinates. He transfers that virus to his sexuality and breaks out in a painful rash a few days later.
Now Herpes comes in two varieties for what we are looking at. I am told that by far the most painful for both men and women is the type that you get on the lip when accidentally transferred to the lower body. I know the official "story" is that it is "rare" but I also know people who have it and have had to have C sections at birth because of its virulence. I once had a student who at the least bit of stress activated the virus and it could occur almost anywhere on the body. I always knew because the difficult physical stretching exercises in voice were impossible for her to tolerate and could even cause the virus to activate. In short, I hate to be so graphic about this but a simple minded destructive thought deserves to be met with medical textbook cases that are not necessarily as Harry says: "cured by abstaining." So back to the minister. Herpes is incurable. His wife doesn't have it. It is by far the most virulent in women in fact many men don't even know that have been exposed to it and I can remember when Doctors didn't take it seriously. It was a Psycho-Analyst friend who told me about how tragic it was for one of her patients that alerted me to the issue. I have always considered health to be one of the important issues for performing artists simply because a common cold can destroy a performance and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost income not only to the Star but to all the people who depend up on that Star for a living. A more serious virus is obviously even more of an issue. Herpes is severely painful and occurs in the most nerve laden areas of the body. It is activated by stress. The performing arts are one of the worst professions for stress and an infection if severe can usually mean the end of a career that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to develop. Herpes spread about the stage from an infected singer can wreak havoc in people's lives. Musical Casts share their germs. That is a fact of our work. Now if you think this is not a big deal for you, consider that the second highest source of income behind the financial sector in New York City is Arts and Culture. Then there are the people in the orchestra in front of all of those plosive consonants and viruses can be spread long distances by the same mechanism that makes consonants understandable to the audience in the singer's diction. This virus is an interesting one because Doctors tell me that if you have it on your hand and you scrub your hand you are likely to infect yourself through tiny cuts that can be caused by the friction of scrubbing. There are special techniques as well as soaps that are used when people are known to have it in order not to spread it to a friend, lover, or spouse. Back to the minister's wife. It is most likely that anyone who has it, in a married couple, will spread it to the other, but condoms do seem to help, according to an article in the NYTimes six months ago. It is difficult to deal with and it is unclear why some get terrible cases while others have a cold sore or two in childhood and then never have it again or rarely, but they are all carriers, "Herpes Henries" or "Marys." Latency in a man does not mean that the virus is not present and friction, like in the HIV virus, is a golden opportunity for Herpes to be spread to the woman. It can occur not only in the sexual tract but in the bowel as well where it is severe. Both varieties I and II can be spread to the lower part of the spine and become an STD. Add that to the fact that age and body chemistry makes this more of an issue as are all immune issues. For example the obesity of all of those preachers can contribute to suppressed immune systems but I won't go there. This issue is a terrible one especially for women and babies. Herpes causes terrible birth defects and as a disease is much harder on women than men according to everything I've read and been told by health care professionals. Now why, if Condoms don't work for stopping the spread of disease, then why do doctors advocate their use in Herpes infections? REH ----- Original Message ----- From: "Karen Watters Cole" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: "Harry Pollard" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "Joe Gichuki" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "Ray Evans Harrell" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "Keith Hudson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Friday, January 10, 2003 11:29 AM Subject: RE: [Futurework] Junk Science (was Stephen Lewis: Help) > Why in God's name are some turning away from science, public health and the > real world today, retreating to the Dark Ages? Because this isn't Eden? > Again, Herbert is not a liberal, anti-social conservative. KWC > > The Secret War on Condoms > By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF, NYT, 01.10.03 > > Three thousand years ago an amorous Egyptian couple (probably libidinous > liberals) experimented with a linen pouch, producing the world's first known > condom. Some right-wingers still haven't gotten over it. > Over the last few years conservative groups in President Bush's support base > have declared war on condoms, in a campaign that is downright weird - but > that, if successful, could lead to millions of deaths from AIDS around the > world. > I first noticed this campaign last year, when I began to get e-mails from > evangelical Christians insisting that condoms have pores about 10 microns in > diameter, while the AIDS virus measures only about 0.1 micron. This is junk > science (electron microscopes haven't found these pores), but the > disinformation campaign turns out to be a far-reaching effort to discredit > condoms, squelch any mention of them in schools and discourage their use > abroad. > "The only absolutely guaranteed, permanent contraception is castration," one > Catholic site suggests helpfully. Hmmmm. You first. > Then there are the radio spots in Texas: "Condoms will not protect people > from many sexually transmitted diseases." > A report by Human Rights Watch quotes a Texas school official as saying: "We > don't discuss condom use, except to say that condoms don't work." > I'm all for abstinence education, and there is some evidence that promoting > abstinence helps delay and reduce sexual contacts both in the U.S. and > abroad. But young people have been busily fornicating ever since sex was > invented, in 1963 (as the poet Philip Larkin put it), and disparaging > condoms is far more likely to discourage their use than to discourage sex. > The upshot will be more gonorrhea and AIDS among young Americans - and, > abroad, many more people dying young. > So far President Bush has not fully signed on to the campaign against > condoms, but there are alarming signs that he is clambering on board. Last > month at an international conference in Bangkok, U.S. officials demanded the > deletion of a reference to "consistent condom use" to fight AIDS and sexual > diseases. So what does this administration stand for? Inconsistent condom > use? > Then there was the Condom Caper on the Web site of the Centers for Disease > Control. A fact sheet on condoms was removed and, eventually, replaced by > one that emphasized that they may not work. > "The Bush administration position basically condemns people to death by > H.I.V./AIDS," said Adrienne Germain, president of the International Women's > Health Coalition. "And we're talking about tens of millions of people." > Evangelical groups do superb work in Africa, running clinics for some of the > world's most wretched people - like poor AIDS victims. So it's baffling to > see these same groups buying into junk science in ways that will lead to > many more AIDS deaths. > (The scientific consensus is simple: Condoms are far from perfect, but they > greatly reduce the risk of H.I.V. and of gonorrhea for men, and they > probably also reduce the risk of other sexual infections - but more studies > are needed to prove the case definitively. See, for example, the National > Institutes for Health report at http://www.niaid.nih.gov/dmid/ > stds/condomreport.pdf.) > One study by the University of California at Berkeley found condom > distribution to be astonishingly cost-effective, costing just $3.50 per year > of life saved. In contrast, antiretroviral therapy cost almost $1,050. > Yet the U.S. is now donating only 300 million condoms annually, down from > about 800 million at the end of the first President Bush's term. Consider > Botswana, which has the highest rate of H.I.V. infection in the world - 39 > percent of adults. According to figures in a report on condoms by > Population Action International, the average man in Botswana gets less than > one condom per year from international donors. > In the time it has taken to read this column, 28 people have died of AIDS, > including 5 children. An additional 49 people have become infected. It's > imperative that we get over our squeamishness, accept that condoms are > flawed but far better than nothing, recognize that condoms no more cause sex > than umbrellas cause rain, and ensure that couples in places like Botswana > get more than one condom per year. > http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/10/opinion/10KRIS.html > outgoing mail scanned by NAV 2002 > > _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://scribe.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
