Going back to the earliest days of this Message Board there's been a lot of discussion about "safe sex" and "danger" and other words and phrases associated with HIV/AIDS and other STDs. These are serious concerns and they rightfully need assessment for your sex life.
Things have changed over the years, of course, with new treatments, PrEP, and the increased number of HIV+ people over age 50 facing special issues with aging, comorbidities, and so on.
Keeping that in mind, I want to share with you an article that was in The Atlantic a few days ago,
People Are Terrified of Sex.
For me, it illustrates some points I've believed in all of my adult life, and I should add that I'm 54 and came out just as HIV/AIDS was beginning to hit gay men. It's always been present in the background or foreground for me. Even though I am HIV-, my partner is a long-term HIV survivor who is increasingly and profoundly disabled from various conditions associated with HIV from the early 80s as well as life-long Type 1 diabetes.
Having said that, my view is that most people simply don't have a clue about actual risk assessment and risk management. I wont pontificate further, instead give you the first few paragraphs of the article.
Quote:
Imagine that a thousand people—randomly selected from the U.S. population—had unprotected sex yesterday. How many of them will eventually die from contracting HIV from that single sexual encounter?
Now, imagine a different thousand people. These people will drive from Detroit to Chicago tomorrow—about 300 miles. How many will die on the trip as a result of a car crash?
Which of those two numbers is bigger?
If you’re anything like the participants in a new study led by Terri D. Conley of the University of Michigan, the HIV estimate should be bigger—a lot bigger. In fact, the average guess for the HIV case was a little over 71 people per thousand, while the average guess for the car-crash scenario was about 4 people per thousand.
In other words, participants thought that you are roughly 17 times more likely to die from HIV contracted from a single unprotected sexual encounter than you are to die from a car crash on a 300-mile trip.
But here’s the deal: Those estimates aren’t just wrong, they’re completely backward.
According to statistics from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the United States National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, you are actually 20 times more likely to die from the car trip than from HIV contracted during an act of unprotected sex.
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There is so much more in this article, including quotes and assessment from the psychologist who led the study, a section about how study participants assessed other diseases - chlamydia and swine flu - and discussion of the larger issue of stigma.
It's not an overly long read and it's well worth the time. I encourage you to take a couple minutes to read the piece, pause and think about it, then come back and share your thoughts here.
~ Bob