Actually, there are several vaccines in the works, and none of them are particulary effective. That's the point of this study. The benefits of the vaccine are so inferior, at least statistically, to the efficacy of being circumcised when compared to being uncircumcised, that the trials of the vaccine are almost unethical to carry out.
Math and stats are NOT my forte. Several other guys who post can give you much more info than I can. BUT: If you vaccinate 10,000 guys at high risk, and after 1 year 10 become infected with HIV compared to 12 out of 10,000 who were not vaccinated, you would have a vaccine that isn't particularly effective. But if half of the 10,000 were cut, and half were not, and 9 of those who became infected were uncut, and and all 12 of in the placebo group were uncut, that would strongly suggest that being circumcised played a major role in the guys NOT becoming infected.
Proof? No. But really, really powerful data suggesting that we just might have a powerful weapon at our disposal, if only it were used. I don't expect a mass movement toward circumcision world wide. I know we do it out of habit here in the States. But from what I'm reading on the internet, the rate is definitely increasing in Australia, the Korean's love it, its becoming almost common in Germany, and so on...
Personally, I like the look. Medically, I think you have to be nuts, for many reasons beyond HIV, to keep that smelly flap of skin
Danny
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